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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 





REV. B. S. MABTIN. 



STRAY THOUGHTS 



FROM A GOLDEN PEN. 



INTENDED AS AN AID TO ALL RECENT CHRISTIAN CONVERTS. 






REV. R. S. MARTIN. 



WITH AN APPENDIX CONTAINING THE GENERAL RULES 
OP THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH. 



7ff« 



AND INTRODUCTION BY 

REV. G. O. McCABE, ID. ID., 

New York. 



"Amicus fidelus medicamentum vitae." 

A faithful friend is the medicine of life. 



CHICAGO : 
DONOHUE & HENNEBERRY 




COPYRIGHTED, 1890, 
BY REV. R. S. MARTIN. 






DEDICATED 

TO THE MEMORY OF MY BOYHOOD FRIEND, 
ELISHA W. CASE, Esq., 

OF 

CHICAGO, ILL. 



He who in my youthful days led me to the Lord. 

R. S. M. 



CONTENTS. 

Dedication, ------« 3 

Introduction, - - - - - 5 

Author's Apology, ------ 7 

Stray Thoughts, - - - - - - 11 

A Christian, ------- 13 

The Convert's Commission, Go I - - - - 29 

A Good Beginning, ------ 31 

Nothing to Do, 43 

Aiming High, ------ 46 

Mother's Tear-Stained Letter, - 59 

Prayer, - 62 

God is Light, ------ 78 

Workers with God, - - - - - 80 

The Old Man's Counsel, ----- 94 

Silent Forces, ------- 97 

Darkness Dispelled by Dawn Divine, - - - 110 

Joy-Bringers, - - - - - - - 113 

Our Chaplain's Plea, - 130 

World-Wide Memorials, - - - - - 132 

Immortal Friends, - - - - - 151 

Discouragements, - - - - - - 154 

Christ and Christmas, - - - - - 172 

Reading and Readers, - - - - - 175 

America's Golden Sunset, ----- 196 

A Good Conscience, - - - - - - 198 

The Village Church-Bell, 211 

Rocks! Rocks! 214 

Old Year and New, ----- 225 

Appendix, - - - - - - - 227 



INTEODUCTIOK 

"Stray thoughts" like stray shots often do 
great execution. The destiny of a soul has some- 
times been decided by an aptly quoted text, a verse 
of an almost forgotten hymn, or some powerful sen- 
tence freighted with eternal truth falling upon the 
listening ear, as the very message of the Lord from 
an unseen world. 

Three prodigals were once sitting at a gambling 
table, absorbed in their game. The fourth member 
of the party, while pondering which card to play 
next, unconsciously began humming Miss Cary's 
beautiful hymn : 

" One sweetly solemn thought 
Comes to me o'er and o'er, 
I'm nearer my home to-day 
Than I ever have been before." 
The game was spoiled ; the voice of God was 
heard ; holy memories of the past were awakened ; 
three lives were changed from that hour ; there was 
joy in the presence of the angels ! 

5 



6 INTRODUCTION. 

The history of the church is full of such 
instances. 

This little book will tend to awaken the care- 
less, to strengthen the weak, to comfort the sorrow- 
ful, to arouse Christians to do their best for God and 
His church. It will make a useful present for young 
converts. Successful pastors will be quick to ap- 
preciate it. It should be kept close at hand and 
each morning a thought lodged in the memory of 
the reader, never more to " stray," but to abide for- 
ever. 

Long life and a wide circulation to "Stray 
Thoughts from a Golden Pen." 



AUTHOK'S APOLOGY. 

I can give but one reason why this volume has 
ever reached the public eye, and that is, in my pas- 
toral and evangelistic services there has seemed a 
necessity for something of this character to be placed 
immediately in the hand and home of each convert 
as an aiding counselor, in what is to them the 
Beginning of Years. 

How much depends on a right beginning ! These 
pages are written to help all such beginners in the 
divine life\ Those whose feet, now, for the first 
time, tread the borders of the spiritual Canaan, and 
whose lips even now taste the spiritual grape-clusters 
of the promised land. 

Dr. Arnold, of "Kugby fame," says: "There 
should be but three objects of human ambition : 1st. 
To be prime-minister of a great kingdom. 2d. To 
be governor of a great empire, and, 3d. To write 
books which live in every age and among every 
people" In this volume I have attempted nothing so 



8 author's apology. 

elaborate or exhaustive, nor have I presumed that 
any of these writings will live in every age, and among 
all people. 

Eather have I sought only to be a "helper in 
Christ," and as such, have offered this small contri- 
bution to the forces already at work, for the Christ- 
ianization of the world. Even as one passes through 
the conservatories of earth, there plucks the bright- 
est, most fragrant and beautiful flowers, then ties 
them with a golden thread, so have I gathered here 
and there, from others' gardens, some rare buds of 
thought, which I have tied in with my own. 

Thus have I tried to cultivate, collect and twine 
together, a bouquet of helpful Christian ideas, the 
fragrance of which I pray may live always in the 
brain, life and character of each reader. I* assure 
each impartial reader that it will furnish me an 
abundant reward, should I learn at any time in the 
future that these " Stray Thoughts " had assisted 
Christian beginners to solve some of the problems of 
life, and more completely fulfill the duties of the age 
in which they live. 



author's apology. 9 

If any one is inclined to criticise the contents, ar- 
rangement or design of this volume, I shall console 
myself with the statement of wise and sympathetic 
Kalph Waldo Emerson, in which he declares, "The 
worst poem is better than the best criticism of it." 
My prayer is that the thoughts here written may 
like the "golden arrow of Ascestes," fly straight to 
the mark; kindle as they fly; and burn as they kindle, 
in the soul of every reader, to whom they may come ! 

In conclusion, we say to others what others have 
said to us : 

Who gives the world a noble thought, 
And writes it out in prose or rhyme, 

May furnish for some lowly soul 
A stepping-stone on which to climb. 

Then send your noblest thoughts abroad, 

Nor idly wait some higher call. 
Give to humanity and God 

Your best : Nor deem the gift too small. 



10 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 





STRAY THOUGHTS. 

All these are but stray thoughts, caught in their flight, 

Or way-marks from one golden pen; 
Yet I would, if I could, in eternal light, 

Trace them all on the hearts of men. 

Re- write them! O, God! for man's thoughts are dead, 

Save as they are quickened by Thee; 
Yet in past, by Thy good spirit touched, they have sped 

As light bearing seraphs o'er islet and sea. 

We commend them to Thee — naught else can we do; 

For, once written, we would not recall. 
Though "a lad's loaves and fishes" for so many seem few* 

In Thy hand they break plenty for all. 

They are written— Lord bless! may they never return 

To the author's heart in vain; 
But in souls of men may they kindle — yea, burn! — 

Into Godward aspiring flame. 

As drops in the ocean, or mites in the chest; 

As sand-grains in tall mounts unseen; 
Like stray beams of sunlight, adown in the west, 

May they help to make brighter life's dream. 

Stray thoughts! fast they came in the hour of joys; 

Or, mayhap, when soul-crushed and distressed, 
On prayer-wings love sends them, as heavenly buoys, 

Trusting through them God's sons may be blessed. 

The bow has been sprung — the arrows are fled — 

They will stop — only God knoweth where; 
And the venture thus made, may it cheer when I'm deadt 

As a sweet song, breathed out on the air. 
11 



12 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



What e'er thou art thy value will appear; 
If thou art bad, no praise will buoy thee up; 
If thou art good, no censure weigh thee 

DOWN. 




A CHKISTIAK 

He, and he only, is the world's true sovereign^ 
who has in heart and life Christianity fully developed! 
A Christian ! This, in its perfected state is the title 
of true nobility ! Compared with it all earthly titles 
are but assumed nothings. King, Queen, President, 
Prince and Czar may each indicate Position, but to 
be worthily titled "a Christian" indicates Condition, 
and is, therefore, of all others the superior. 

To have it said by onlookers and enemies, as was 
said of Daniel, " He is a man in whom is the spirit 
of the Holy Gods," is infinitely to be preferred to 
the sham titles of mock royalty given to purple-clad 
kings sitting and sinning on the thrones of earth- 
Not unfrequently does history portray in awful light 
the many crowns and coronets under which have 
been troubled heads and aching hearts. It has 
pointed to scepters held in the hands of rulers, who, 
while controlling others, were themselves the veriest 
slaves of sin. 

13 



14 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

How vastly superior the crown and scepter of 
the Christian ! They touch a hand and press a brow 
bold in the strength of purity, calm in the peace of 
Heaven. 

The wearer, glories in them and the giver, while 
the world in general gazes in admiration upon this 
moral hero, who by God's grace has vanquished sin, 
and thus become heir-apparent of the upper throne, 
which is in reserve, and awaits the coming of this 
triumphant disciple, who only, in truth, is the 
world's conqueror. 

To be worthily called " A Christian," is the high- 
est ambition of the noblest, purest soul — higher 
than this we need not soar ; with less than this we 
should never be content. To be a Christian is more 
than to have merely attained the world's standard 
of morality. It is something higher, deeper and 
far more full of meaning. It is that divine life in 
the soul which reaches up to heaven, and down to 
the depths of man's inner self. 

It is a recreation which beautifully manifests its 
presence and power in the transformed thought, 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 15 

life and character of the individual. It is the 
result, not alone of reformation, but of regener- 
ation. It is not satisfied with merely " a new leaf 
being turned over," it requires an entire new hook. 

True Christianity ! It not only says reform, but, 
in thunder peals, cries out Bepent! It requires not 
only that we do better, but that we he better, and 
thus, by its clear, ringing statements of rich, spirit- 
ual truth, excels all other theories for reforming and 
elevating mankind. 

It never attempts to smother the wrong by an 
elaborate patchwork of good deeds. It is an entirely 
new force in the soul, a force which gives the pos- 
sessors the right to be called "New creatures in 
Christ." It neither attempts to disguise or odorize 
what ought to be destroyed at once and forever by 
fire from off God's altar. 

Among chemists there are two forces utilized. 
One is technically termed an odorament, the other 
a disinfectant. The former is used to overpower, or 
disguise disagreeable and unhealthy odors, the latter 
is an aromatic preparation used to destroy disagree- 



16 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

able odors : One disguises, the other destroys / A 
Christ life is the result of applied heavenly disin- 
fectants. Not merely a disguising of the disagree- 
able odors of past sinful life, but a cleansing, wash- 
ing, purifying of the soul, and a destroying of the 
blotted record of the past. Yes ! more, it is the 
bringing back of the spiritual nature of man to the 
image of God, in which he was originally created ! 

It is the in-putting of holy energies and sublime 
aspirations I It is the out-burning of heaven- 
kindled fires ! It is the outward working of heaven- 
sent and soul-filling forces, which lift the possessor 
above himself and his surroundings, and make his 
character sublime, attractive and trustworthy ! 

In a recent sermon, eloquent and impressive, by a 
leading and learned Bishop, the value of such a char- 
acter and its influence in critical hours, was most 
strikingly portrayed, as he described how one such 
character, though but youthful and incomplete, turned 
the federal troops from their intended march, which 
could have resulted only in defeat, and swung them 
into lines of victory ! Said he: " During the war, 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 17 

General Lee and his officers met on one of the streets 
of Chambersburg, Pa., and, after careful consulta- 
tion, decided to change their course and march to 
Gettysburg instead of Harrisburg toward which 
they had been marching. A farmer's boy, a chris- 
tian lad, from the second-story window, overlooking 
the soldier-scene below, heard the conversation. 

Quickly and carefully the lad followed them to 
see that they took the line of march decided upon, 
and, when he was certain of their design, he rapidly 
hurried to the nearest telegraph office, and dis- 
patched the following news to Governor Curtin of 
Pennsylvania: "Lee with his troops has gone to 
Gettysburg." The electric flash flew over the wire. 
The despatch was received, torn open, and read; 
and immediately the boy was sent for, and brought 
to the Governor by a special engine which traveled 
at the rate of sixty-five miles an hour! Hastily was 
the lad brought in to the private quarters of the Gov- 
ernor to be questioned by him and his staff. To 
every enquiry, however critical and searching, he 
gave the same unvarnished answers ! The Governor 



18 STBAY THOUGHTS. 

knew that if his statements were true it was the 
most important news that could be received ! Upon 
its truthfulness depended the safety of the state, and 
perhaps, of the nation ! Greatly excited, the Gov- 
ernor turned aside for a moment and said, in a per- 
plexed undertone, to his staff, "I would give my 
right hand to Know that this lad tells the truth." 
Just then a soldier standing near stepped up and 
said, " Governor, I know that boy I I lived for 
years in his neighborhood, and I know it is abso- 
lutely impossible for him to tell a lie! He is a 
christian boy, and there is not a drop of false blood 
in his veins ! ! 

That was enough ! In five minutes the news was 
telegraphed to headquarters, and in fifteen minutes 
the Union troops were pushing on to Gettysburg, 
where was fought one of the most decisive battles 
of the late Civil war. Ah! It was the unsullied, 
honest, well-known character, of the noble Chris- 
tian lad that turned the troops of the Union into 
the victorious battle-field of Gettysburg, which gave 
them lasting glory. Thus is it always, and every- 



STKAY THOUGHTS. 19 

where. Christian character is the core upon which 
the world turns. It is the pivot of destiny. Kepu- 
tation may be but the heated breath of public opin- 
ion, but character is the verdict of the eternal Judge. 
This is the jewel that blazes only on the brow of 
true royalty. 

In every true Christian experience there is just 
such a rich, deep, bedrock life to be lived. A life 
which is not frothy, superficial or shallow, but 
which touches the very depths of being, and thus 
makes every true possessor " A crown of glory in 
the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand 
of his God." In the christianization of souls, there 
is a double purpose: first, to " redeem from all in- 
iquity," and second, to " purify unto himself a 
peculiar people, zealous of good worksP And this 
zeal for others should flame up into a constant and 
burning activity. 

No Christian life terminates in itself. It is a 
living active force, producing needed results. It not 
only gets good for itself, but, like a summer cloud, 
gathers, that it may give again. A true Christian life 



20 STKAY THOUGHTS. 

never was, it never can be, inactive. It will always 
be producing impressions and effecting results in the 
life and character of every observant associate. 

It will be ever manifesting that which is the direct 
outgrowth of inner graces. The outburstings of 
divinely kindled flames burning in the souls of men. 
It is incessantly proving to the race of man the pos- 
sibility of bringing the soul and body of man into 
their proper and God-designed relations to each other. 
It infuses into the souls of men a force which gives 
them moral dignity, and leads the soul to assert its 
right over, and control of , the body. Like the youth- 
ful Damascus-road convert, every young Christian 
should rise up into new and higher realms of man 
hood and womanhood, and declare as emphatically 
as he did, " I keep my body under." Such was the 
noble declaration of Paul. 

When the more than noonday glory light fell 
upon and around him, and the scales dropped from 
off his zealous Jewish eyes, he resolved that the true 
man, the ego, should be master of the mere habita- 
tion, the body. The body is one thing, the man, 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 21 

the living soul, the immortal within, is quite an- 
other. 

Keason alone tells us that the watch works are 
more valuable, and far more important than the case 
in which they are enclosed. But reason and inspira- 
tion combine to tell us that the soul is greater and 
far more noble than the body. 

The newborn soul catches this glimpse of its God- 
created greatness, and, asserting its right to rule, 
it struggles as a bird in the fowler's net till it frees 
itself, then rises up and away into heights of moral 
grandeur to the summits of which, hitherto, it seemed 
impossible to advance. A Christian life means self- 
acquaintance, acquaintance with God, with Christ, 
with the Holy Spirit ; with the great code of ethics 
written down in the book of God. It means all this 
and more. 

As says Mendenhall in his comparison of " Paul 
and Plato": " An intellectual acquaintance with its 
truths or with itself as a system of truths, and a 
belief in them was all that religion required until Chris- 
tianity appeared, which, in addition thereto, required a 



22 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

spiritual apprehension of its truths and a special 
experience of their meaning and power" 

Conversion according to Christianity, is not 
merely an intellectual change, or a change of belief, 
or a change of sentiment, or a change of truths* 
Important as such change is, and involved in con- 
version as it is, it is not conversion itself, nor 
may conversion be defined, merely, as a change of 
relations to religion, for while such change is a 
condition, it is not the essence of religious life. 

Regeneration involving external conduct and 
individual relations, is richer in its spiritual import, 
and more comprehensive in its spiritual range. It 
has reference to a new life in man. It is an organic 
spiritual life, that did not previously exist. Sa 
great is the change in character, that when it occurs 
it equals a new birth and is divinely so described. 
The man is new; New in his sentiments; New in 
his faith; New in his external relations; New in 
his intellectual apprehensions; New in his spiritual 
life ! Indeed ! Language can not adequately portray 
the change, it can only declare that it has taken place 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 23 

Such is the change Christianity requires in its 
subjects, and such, too, is the change recognized in 
thousands of the converts who are now finding their 
way into the visible church of Christ. 

But how is this change, so marvelous, and with 
so many, brought about ? It is because a new force 
has entered the soul; a force which none can 
conceive or comprehend, save those who accept the 
Savior, and even they can not fully explain all 
they joyfully experience ! To them and them only 
is it given to " Know the mysteries of the Kingdom.'* 

In one of Goethe's beautiful fairv tales, he tells 
of a wonderful silver lamp, which, when hung up 
in the fisherman's rude hut, changed the cabin and 
all within it to silver. So, this gospel of Christ, 
admitted to the human heart, changes, alters, it 
into moral beauty — transforming its selfishness , hard- 
ness, cruelty, and inhumanity, to love, gentleness^ 
kindness, sweetness, ministry. It is a force which 
finds its way into the hearts of mortals, and works 
out through the hard crust of their lives, until they 
are reformed, and built up into the sublime 
tempers and dispositions of Christ. 



24 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

In the city of Eome, there is one bronze statue, 
and in our "National Capitol, Washington" there 
is another, each of which stand out preeminent, and 
always attractive to travelers. The former repre- 
sents " Luther " during the reformation, breaking the 
Papal chains from off a myriad priest-directed 
souls. The other memorializes " Lincoln " stooping 
to loose the chains of the suppliant southern slave ! 
Tears of joyous gratitude have fallen at the foot of 
each statue as there stood gazing up on those bronze 
representations, the persons who have been delivered 
by the faith-preaching of the one, and the pen- 
marked emancipation proclamation of the other. 
Their lives were useful, their memories sacred, and a 
mere shadowy bronze representation was enough to 
evoke from the delivered ones, tears of thankfulness 
and words of highest praise. 

True, we may not all be u Luthers," thundering 
the faith-creed in the ears of mankind, and arousing 
the world with ringing notes of gospel alarm ; nor, 
can we all be " Lincolns," liberating our dark-hued 
brother- in-bonds, but every Christian may, nay, 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 25 

should be, a reformer, a liberator, in the sense of 
remoulding and refashioning the thoughts and lives 
of others, and breaking the sin-shackles from the 
souls of men ! Such is the new line of life and work 
to which you have so recently offered yourself in 
public consecration ; and this new life will be beauti- 
ful, useful and satisfactory, just in proportion as 
your Christian character is acceptable to God and 
yourself. I say "yourself, " because the highway of 
a Christian life, though straight and narrow, is so 
plain, that we, ourselves, are immediately conscious 
of wrong when we retreat or deflect to the right or 
left in the slightest instance, or fail in the perform- 
ance of even the minor duties of life. Therefore, be 
honest with thy God ! Be honest with the world ! 
Be honest with thyself ! u Keep thyself pure," for 
purity is power ! All are cognizant of these self- 
evident truths ; but, alas ! there are those who, 

"E'en in penance, seem 
Planning sins anew." 

And to such vacillating, and pledge-breaking souls, 

with the purity vow still fresh upon their lips, comes a 



26 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

new, or an old temptation, with a force they never 
dreamed it had ! Comes, and, comes to ruin, and leave 
in bitterness, every guileful soul, for such are sure 
to be ensnared. 

This way, to you, may appear new and almost 
untrodden, with only an occasional and infrequent 
traveler; but, young convert, the newness of the 
line of march is only apparent, not real, for it is the 
old path on which a long list of worthies has gone 
before you, with Christ in the van, leading the vast 
procession. Yea, every inch of this divinely illu- 
minated pathway is holy ground, for it has been con- 
secrated by a host of the noblest, purest names the 
world has ever known ; names of which the world 
is not worthy. 

All along this line has been witnessed the most 
heroic self-denial and suffering ! The most beauti- 
ful, wise and intense earnestness ! The largest and 
most unselfish liberality, and the most complete and 
triumphant victories of which historic page has any 
record ! And this great cloud of glorified, unseen 
and princely witnesses encompass and encamp round 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 27 

about you, and eagerly crowd on either side your 
race-way to the celestial city, and ever and anon 
amid their joyous acclamations of triumph, they turn 
to cheer you with their comfort songs, breathed out 
upon the air, bidding you by a thousand sympathetic 
cords of love, COME ON! COME ON!! COME 
ON!!! 



28 



STKAY THOUGHTS. 




Every duty we omit obscures some truth 
we should have known. 





But the Lord said unto me, " Say not 
i am a child, for thou shalt go to all 
that i shall send thee and whatsoever i 




Jer. y i: 7, 



8TRAY THOUGHTS. 2& 



THE CONVERT'S COMMISSION, GO! 

Go! New-born souls! all royal priests! 

More; Sons of the living God! 
Bid all mankind to the upper feasts 

Ere they're silent 'neath the sod. 

Go! Bear to thy brother, e'en as borne to thee 
God's truth; that grand message of power 

Then, like thee, shall he, be also made free 
And rejoice in the Lord's pardoning hour. 

Go! Shed the light of a saintly soul 

Out-fling thee a myriad rays, 
Which, shall wave-like ever, and ever on-roll 

Through uncounted and oncoming days. 

Go! Sprinkle the salt of a Savior's grace 
That long since did reach thine heart, 

As a saving force in the world, take a place 
And faithfully do thy part. 

Go ! Scatter the scents of a godly life 

O'er all the wide, wide, earth, 
And sweeten the hearts, long bittered with strife 

Who've had naught but grief from birth. 

Go! Thou in thy might, in the strength of God. 

Rest not till thy work is done, 
Tread thou in the path thy Lord hath trod 

Then, forever, shine on! as the sun. 



30 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



"This motto to all, when I am dead, 
Be sure you're right, then Go ahead. 

Crockett. 




STKAY THOUGHTS. 31 



A GOOD BEGINNING. 

In Christ's inaugural address or what is com- 
monly called the sermon on the mount, two builders 
are held up in contrast : One is called a wise, the 
other a foolish man. The terms are applied, not 
because of the different houses built, for, the super- 
structure may have been similar in design, material 
and workmanship, but, the distinction was made 
because one had a good and the other a had begin- 
ning. One a rock, and the other, a sand foundation 
upon which the upper structure was erected. 

Thus, by parabolic teaching, the gathered multi- 
tudes who listened, learned from the Christ-lips the 
vast importance of substantial basal supports. He 
seemed to be ever crowding this upon the minds of 
His auditors as the first great necessity of a suc- 
cessful life. 

God's ample provision of a safe and sufficient 
base, has been the burden of prophecy, the song of 



32 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

the Psalms and the very soul of the inspired writ- 
ings. Seven hundred years prior to the advent of 
Christ, Isaiah struck his prophetic harp and sang 
divinely in the nation's ears " Behold ! saith the Lord, 
I lay in Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, 
a precious corner-stone, a sure foundation." 

David, the royal singer of Israel's throne found 
in the world everywhere, a trembling base and great 
uncertainty. Oft had his feet been fast in the mire, 
and, soul sunk as he lingered, if but a moment, on 
the quick-sands of earth's strongest supported sys- 
tems, but fully appreciating the stability of the age- 
rock upon which his feet had been so lately and 
firmly set, he sings aloud, "If this foundation be 
destroyed what can the righteous do ? " 

So, too, Paul, the gospel pioneer to the gentiles, 
enforced with inspired letter this same fact when he 
declared, " Other foundation can no man lay than 
that is laid, even Jesus Christ," and every resident of 
Corinth to whom he wrote, caught his full meaning 
and quickly learned a truth-spiritual from a fact- 
natural, for they knew that for years their hillsides 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 33 

had been rifled of their tri-deep, magnificent, marbled 
rocks, Ionian, ^Egean, Corinthian, any of which, for 
the purposes of under-solidity, were in all the world 
unexcelled. Indeed, their pride and boasting were 
in buildings of beauty resting upon foundations 
as solid as the superstructures were superb. By 
them, too, the Pauline idea was quickly grasped 
when again he said, "As a wise master-builder I have 
laid the foundation, therefore, let every man take 
heed how he buildeth thereupon; gold, silver, pre- 
cious stones, wood, hay, stubble, for if a man's work 
abide which he hath built when the fire flame of 
Judgment shall burn and reveal what sort it is he 
shall receive a reward." Paul's idea was, Christ our 
foundation, first ! last ! and forever ! ! 

Beginning on this foundation, young convert, 
you can build up a stalwart christian character that 
shall stand four-square to all the winds of heaven 
and defy every storm. Yes, even the non-spiritual, 
unholy and demonized attacks of the enemy! 

God ; Christ ; Spirit ; Heaven ; Immortality; all 
these are new forces which have recently entered 



34 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

thy soul by the avenues of preaching, holy living, and 
spiritual song. Under their inspiration you have 
rock-planted your feet, poised your soul, and plumed 
its wings preparatory to an upward, heavenward 
flight. You have solemnly said, " I am no longer 
content to dwell in caves lit up only by the feeble 
torch-lights of the senses ! Hereafter I shall follow 
and walk in the light of, not these alone, but in the 
work, way, and word, of God." 

Good! Such vows are heaven-recorded. Such 
vows are heaven pleasing. They are an index to 
your future life, for thus has God looked upon them, 
and in view of your vows he has already commis- 
sioned and sent forth those " twin sisters, goodness 
and mercy " to follow you, if you continue to follow 
Him, all the days of your life. 

Your starting steps are worthy and will receive 
the plaudits of good men everywhere ; but brilliant 
as may be the " beginning " do not err in thinking 
that the beginning is all. Do not canopy-cover the 
foundation, and live forever there, for, the super- 
structure, the top stories of your experience, must be 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 35 

upbuilt, until tower, minerat and dome, yea I all the 
upper spiritual edifice shall gleam and glisten under 
the rays of Heaven's touch. Yes, gleam like myriad 
pearls under the sun-touch of the eternal throne. 

It is the design of God not that you be forever 
relaying the foundation, but that you leave the 
beginning principles of the doctrine of Christ, and 
"go on unto perfection." Christian perfection, 
which alone can lead you up to the summits of the 
transfigured glory heights, and which, if you so 
choose, will leave you not till you reach the jeweled 
throne of Heaven. Move onward ! Move upward ! 
Move God ward ! ! Do your best, and never rest sat- 
isfied until your best is done ; and while you are doing 
your best, study the better that others have done before 
you. Such are the words inscribed over the portals 
of " De Pauw Art Halls," and the inspiring thought 
wrapped up in the folds of this silent sentence 
should be spirit-traced in the mind of every be- 
ginner in the divine life. Oh! Young Convert! 
Be now, do now, all that you shall have wished you 
had been, and done, in the years that are yet to 



36 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

come ! What you are now, determines largely what 
you will be in the future, for as the roots of the pres- 
ent lie deep in the past, so the fruit of the future 
will be as the root of to-day. 

As we plant the seed in the spring-time, but fill 
not our garners till the autumn come ; as we strike 
deep the rootlets of the tender tree, cover them, and 
then wait years for the fullness of the fruit ; so the 
grandeur of your new-begun Christian-life, does not, 
meteor-like, hurl itself, with all its maximum-splen- 
dors, at once, and immediately upon the world's eye, 
but, sun-like, gradually rises to its meridian, where 
it loses its sun-likeness, for instead of dimming and 
declining at noon-tide it soars up-and-away, flooding 
with light the universe of man as it ascends to meet 
its God. 

Keep ever in memory that your present actions, 
in a large degree, determine your future character 
and rewards, for, it is written in letters more lasting 
than could be formed by brilliant stars upon the mid- 
night sky " Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he 
also reap." Yes ! and the same unalterable truth is 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 37 

given in other words, modernized, but, perhaps, not 
improved : which declares 

The issues of the life to be 

We weave with colors all our own 
And in the fields of destiny 

We reap as we have sown. 

Convert of Christ ! forever remember that a real, 
substantial, Christian life is not a thing of mushroom 
growth, requiring only a few hours to reach maturity. 
It is rather the result of God's up-lifting, and the 
reward of man's up-reaching, during all his days, 
weeks, months, and years! Tes! A beautifully 
symmetrical, and, sterling Christian character, is a 
fruit which it costs all the years of a man's life to 
form, ripen, and bring to perfection ! Young Chris- 
tian beginner ! You are on the royal-road that leads 
to such an ultimate outcome, and, prospectively you 
are the victor, for, you seek and you have true reli- 
gious principle, which has ever proven itself to be 
the best weapon for the conflicts of the present life, 
and the only hope-inspirer of the life that is to be. 
Build deep. Build broad. Build High. And in all 



38 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

thy building, trust not yourself, nor in your own 
work, but, in God who is thy sure support. 

In the world there are many light-houses, but we 
grant that the most famous, and well-known, is the 
"Eddystone" on the Cornwall coast of England. 
Three times, it has been built. Twice to perish with 
its boastful builders, but, finally to stand because 
founded on the thought of God. 

The learned and eccentric "Winstanley" who 
first built it was very proud of his workmanship, as 
seen in this structure, and, from the lofty balcony, 
boldly defied the sea-storms, calling aloud, and 
saying, " Blow Winds ! Eise, O Ocean ! Break 
forth! ye elements! and, try my work!" This he did 
many times, but, one fearful night of storm and tem- 
pest, tower and builder, sank together in the sea, and 
were but wrecks upon the water-waves. 

Then, " Eudgard " reconstructed it of wood and 
stone. Its size and shape were perfect, but the 
material used gave hold to the elements, so, that, 
one careless act wrapped the structure in sheets of 
fire, and together at last, building and builder, per- 
ished in the flames. 



STBAY THOUGHTS. 39 

Finally "Smeaton" the noble, Christian mechanic, 
was asked to rebuild it again, and from the solid 
sea-rock-base, he raised a cone, which he riveted to the 
oam* covered-rocks, even, as the oak is fastened to 
the earth by its roots. Upon such a foundation he 
raised a structure, upon which he carved no boastful 
inscription, but, on whose lowest rock-course, he 
chiseled deep these words, " Except the Lord build the 
house, they labor in vain that build it," and, on its 
key-stone, above the central and largest light, this 
trustful tribute, "Laus Deo," " Praise God," and, to 
this day "Eddystone" light-house is standing, with 
uplifted and out-flashing beacon-lights, a blessing to 
every storm-tossed, tempest-driven mariner along its 
billow-beaten strand. 

O ! Young convert ! Look well to the foundation 
upon which you build. Let the rootlets of your faith 
strike deep into the bleeding but tender-loving heart 
of Jesus. Let your confidence begin there, then, 
build thou up to Heaven. 

In conclusion, I would if possible trace in your 
memory and carve upon your heart, the eloquent and 



4:0 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

significant words, with which, more than fifty years 
ago, "Leonard Bacon" closed an address to a class 
of young converts. These were his burning words, 
" Would to God I could make you know what results 
are depending upon you ! What interests of the 
church and of a dying world are involved in your 
present ' beginning,' as well as your future character 
and efforts ! " When I look at the young Christians 
of this age and reflect, that, they are soon to sustain 
the ancient glories of the church of God ! When I look 
abroad upon the earth and see the crisis that is just 
at hand ! When I listen to the cries that come from 
every quarter of the world, summoning the people of 
God to new effort, and more splendid exhibitions of 
piety ! I seem to see the olden generation of the 
past, rising up from their repose, to watch over these 
new followers of Christ ! I seem to hear the voices 
of the blessed spirits from above, cheering them on 
in their career of piety I I seem to see a world of 
misery turning its imploring hands to them, and 
beseeching them to be worthy of their privileges ; 
worthy of their noble destiny ! I seem to hear, nay ! 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 41 

I do hear, God himself speaking from the heavens 
saying " Ye have chosen the better part, yours is a 
1 good beginning? Be now and ever, ' faithful unto 
death and I will give the a crown of life ! ' " 



42 



STKAY THOUGHTS. 



Wasted moments send us into eternity 



FULL OF SORROW AND REGRET. 




Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, Do |j 

IT WITH THY MIGHT, FOR THERE IS NO WORK; ® 

* NOR device; nor knowledge; nor wisdom; in • 

THE GRAVE WHITHER THOU GOEST. 




JEJccles., ix: 10 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 43 

NOTHING TO DO. 

" Nothing to do ! " are the words we hear, 

Alas ! from too many, each day; 
And the false words ring in the Christian's ear 

As he turns in sorrow away. 
For he knows how " white the fields " are 

And how ready the harvest, too ! 
Oh ! It gives him grief most poignant, deep, 

To hear the words ' ' Nothing to do ! " 

Nothing to do ! Have we hearts of steel ? 

Our eyes are they doubly closed ; 
Are there none in sickness we can heal, 

None for whom sympathy flows ? 
In this their time of deepest distress, 

When with anguish their hearts are riven, 
Arise ! in God's glory and brightness, 

And tell them, O tell them of Heaven. 

" The poor ye have always with you," 

Were the words of the Master, then ; 
Though ages have passed and many have died, 

There are still many poor among men. 
Let us look in these homes of the needy, 

Then, to God and our conscience be true, 
And the words will not linger more on our lips, 

" There is nothing for me to do ! " 

There are children to lead to the Bible-school, 
In whose homes pure joys never dwell ; 

They need some words of kindness, 
They are waiting for you to tell 



44 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

Of a better Way ! and Life ! and Home ! 

Yes ! Wait in their sadness for you ; 
O ! Lose no more time, Christian brother, 

In declaring " There is nothing to do ! " 

The withering-blight of a brazen sin 

Is cursing our broad, fair, land ; 
There is needed some power to check it, 

It needs your heart, your hand 
To seize this mighty monster, " Drink," 

Which imperils even you ! 
O ! God ! while this demon still is loose, 

Shall we say ' ' There is nothing to do ? " 

" Nothing to do ! You may say it, when 

The world 's at the Master's feet, 
And royally-robed in his garments of light 

The " ancient of days " takes his seat. 
When all nations of earth, His scepter obey 

And hand, heart, and life, give him, too ! 
Then, may you truly, but not till then, say 

" There is nothing that I can do ! " 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



45 




The best and noblest lives are those g 



WHICH ARE SET TOWARD HIGH IDEALS, AND THE ft 
2 HIGHEST AND NOBLEST IDEAL THAT ANY MAN S 

can have is, JESUS OP NAZEKETH. 1 




$ AS WE BECOME LIKE THOSE WITH WHOM WE 

& ASSOCIATE, SO THE MORE WE ARE IN CHRIST'S 

tt Company in study, thought, prayer, and 

H wish, the more will we become like Him. 



46 STEAY THOUGHTS. 



AIMING HIGH. 

The sweep of centuries has not erased the Pauline 
injunction "Let this mind be in you which was also 
in Christ Jesus." The mind, the disposition, the 
general characteristics of Christ, his life retraced in 
our life; this, is the Alpine height which we are 
called to ascend ! To attain a full reflection of the 
mind of Christ is ambition-angelic ! higher than this 
even seraphs can not soar ! Young converts ! your 
task is a great one, but, your possibilities are also 
great. 

It is impossible for you now to conceive the above- 
cloud summits to which you may yet rise. Your 
present ideal height may be your future valley-lands, 
for, as you near the light of the throne eternal, God 
reveals ever-ascending and up-piling peaks of per- 
fection, which, hitherto, had been undiscovered, 
unknown, and hence by you unsought. In the realm 
of spiritual truth and moral perfection, there are 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 47 

always, and ever will be, " More worlds to conquer ! " 
One high attainment in the life-divine will make pos- 
sible one higher, and that another, and thus we may- 
ascend; conquer; capture; and keep; all the heights of 
Christian possibility. While it is a task more than 
gigantic to become, all at once, "perfect even as 
your father who is in heaven is perfect," yet, one 
may by true consecration, earnest thought, purpose, 
and prayer, become much better than he now is, for? 
this " battle is the Lord's," the final issues of which 
are to be as you by life and effort shall direct. As 
a very small obstruction sometimes turns the course 
of a rill-stream, and by its windings and deflectings 
loses its usefulness ; and sometimes its separate exist- 
ance, so, a very little wrong thing may alter the 
upward course of thy life, turn thee to the right 
hand or left, and eventually destroy thy usefulness 
if not thy spiritual life entire. As "it is the little 
foxes that spoil the vines " so, it is the little deeds of 
thy life which tear down, or, build up thy Christian 
character, and cause it to be dwarfed and misshapen, 
or, strong, influential, and satisfactory. 



48 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

A massive, beautiful edifice, must first have a 
foundation deep, broad, and substantial, then may it 
rise to perfection and completeness, by properly plac- 
ing rock upon rock, and, binding each to the other, 
and each to all with cleaving chains of cement ! So, 
may a character rise in all its attractiveness and 
beauty, which has Christ for its foundation, the 
Apostles as corner-stones, and a myriad, words, ways 
and little deeds, each one a rock in this newer, holier, 
temple of the Lord, each cemented to each and each 
to all by the binding cement of Calvary's blood-flow! 
God notices these little deeds and beautifies the life 
in keeping with them. 

For, after all, a Christian life is as a chain, the 
longest of which is but a union of links, or as a jour- 
ney, the longest of which is but a succession of steps ! 
and as the last link in the longest chain may be 
eventually reached by a hand-over-hand movement, 
and the last step in the longest journey be taken by 
a continual plodding, so, thy character by a proper 
attention to life's little duties, will be built up, and 
rounded out, in most perfect symmetry. 



STRAY THUGHOTS. 49 

Do not neglect the smaller duties of a religious 
life. In the mind of God every thing has value ! for 
to all appearances he seems on the morning of cre- 
ation to have made a leaf, or an atom, with as much 
care, as if he were creating a world. He polished 
the scaly coat of the smallest insect with as much 
interest as if he were feathering the wing of a cloud- 
cleaving eagle. God notices and records little things ! 

True, the planting of an acorn is not much in 
itself, yet, if it is given time sufficient it will become 
a forest which shall shake like Lebanon. A mustard- 
seed of itself seems nothing, but under the touch of 
God, it rises, ascends and ever grows till it becomes 
a wide spreading tree in whose branches and under 
whose shadows the fowls of Heaven lodge. 

The leaven by itself is valueless but when placed 
in the meal it leavens, labors, and works, until the 
whole is like itself. The " stone cut of the moun- 
tain without hands" was very small, and to all 
human appearances as powerless a thing as the 
stones of the valley at the mountain foot, but, 
started by the enginery of the upper world it rolled 



50 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

along and ever downward till lo ! it filled the val- 
ley in its flight. 

The acorn, leaven, mustard-seed, and mountain- 
rock, all alike worked slowly, perhaps unseen, yet 
they ever and always worked, and, thus eventually 
gave to the world dense-forests, refreshing-shades, 
firm-rocks, and leavened-blessings. The avalanche ! 
what can withstand its movements ? 

The world trembles under its terrific tread ; yet 
how slow its pace ! so slow as to be imperceptible to 
the casual and careless observer. Indeed ! it is said 
of " Agazziz " who was born and reared amid the 
Alps, of Switzerland that, even he, could not tell 
when the avalanche moved except as he made marks 
to test it, yet it did move, and in its final movement 
carried everything in its track. Young disciple! 
Let this lesson be carved on thy heart, this lesson of 
constant, though it may be but gradual advance, an 
advance which can result only from minute and con- 
scientious attention to what the world calls " little 
things." This alone can give you the beauty of a 
successful Christian life, and put you in the pathway 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 51 

of future honors from, the Hand of him who hath 
said " He that is faithful in that which is least, 
is faithful also in much." If your upward march 
has not been as rapid as you had hoped ; if you 
have not progressed in the divine life as you 
intended and desired, be not disheartened, but 
rather, now, Loose thyself from every entanglement, 
and, Press On! Press on!! Press on!!! This 
is godlike ! ! The ladder which you have begun 
to climb is a tall one ; it has many rounds ; and 
as tall ladders are liable to fall, it becomes a neces- 
sity that you have a solid base upon which to rest 
it, and, a strong brace against which to lean it. 

As you can not place a one-hundred-foot ladder 
against a fifty-foot wall and climb to its top in 
safety, no more can you safely ascend this spiritual 
ladder except as its top disappears beyond the clouds 
and leans against God's Throne, then, but not till 
then, may you upward move in safety, round by 
round, gradually! surely! joyously! triumphantly. 

We have not wings, we can not soar, 
But we have feet to scale and climb 

By slow degrees, by more and more 
The cloudv summits of our time. 



52 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

Such, are the beautiful words of " Longfellow Jy 
concerning advance in the present life, and such must 
be your thought concerning the present-divine-life, 
and the lif e-that-is-to-be. O ! what marvelous possi- 
bilities are before every recreated, spirit-born, God- 
inspired being, who is walking with Christ in white, 
unsullied robes. The world! The world is under 
the foot of such a man, under the foot of Him, over 
whose heart sin has no power. Yes ! to such an one an 
already conquered world is ready to submit. Aim 
high ! Never rest satisfied with less than the likeness 
of Christ, for this should be the great object of every 
Christian life, even as it is the drift of revelaiton, the 
design of Apostolic preaching, yes, the great, centra, 
idea of Christianity. Says Bishop Peck, " The vast 
scheme of suffering, teaching, labor and agency has 
all been produced and is carried on solely to deliver 
man from his sins and ultimately perfect every Chris- 
tian character; this produced the pastorate in all its 
forms, and this only caused God to give to the 
church <c some apostles, some prophets, some evangel- 
ists, some pastors and some teachers for the perfect- 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 53 

ing of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for 
the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come 
to the unity of faith, in the knowledge of the Son of 
God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the 
stature of the fullness of Christ. 

God ! His word ! The Spirit ! and our own 
inspired aspirations make the ascent a glorious possi- 
bility, even up to the arch-key of Christian character. 
Dear reader, you have not yet reached this radiant 
point where all the graces of God converge into a 
Maze of glory, but you have started out on the only 
royal road ever shown to man, by which that point 
may be attained. 

He, whose beginning is at Calvary, may u go on 
from strength to strength," changing from glory to 
glory as by the Spirit of the Lord " and this the 
beginner will do, so long as he continues to walk in 
" the path of the just that shineth more and more 
unto the perfect day ! " O ! what heights are within 
range of possibility ! Paul caught a glimpse of 
these future possibilities in the young Ephesian lives, 
<and, throwing himself upon his knees he prayed, that, 



54 STEAT THOUGHTS. 

" God would grant unto them the riches of his glory y 
that they might be strengthened with might by his 
spirit," and thus equipped " might apprehend with 
all saints, the breadth, length, depth, and height, and 
know the love of Christ," and finally " be filled with 
all the fullness of God." How much we have in 
the divine life ! how much more have we been able to 
ash for and think of and yet, wonderful as it may 
seem, " He is able to do exceedingly, abundantly, 
above all that we can ask or think" 

No wonder that the " chief of the apostles" cried 
out with ecstatic joy "Unto Him be glory in the 
church throughout all generations forever and ever. 

As you look up from the valley of repentance, and 
contemplate beginning the ascent to the holy city, 
how far away it it appears to the highest heights! 
Can it be that I shall ever attain to such glorious 
heights as I see beyond me ? The mere thought of 
attempting to reach and touch those distant, out- 
hanging stars of divine grace almost wearies one 
until he remembers that there is one way of reaching 
those sublime, moral altitudes, and that is, by walk- 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 55 

ing hand-in-hand with him who ascends " far above 
all principalities and powers ! and seats himself at the 
right hand of the throne of God." 

This ascent can not be accomplished in a moment, 
an hour, a day, a month, or a year ; for 

Heaven is not reached by a single bound; 

But we build the ladder by which we rise, 
And we mount to its summit round by round, 

From the lowly earth to the vaulted skies. 

O ! there is comfort for the convert in this fact, that 
while the summit of a Christian life is very high, and 
very far away, yet the ascent is possible, for, its 
gradual slope is ever upward, and Godward, with 
all the magnetic graces and glories of Heaven to 
draw the soul up and along. Yast seems the space, 
and great the difference between the coal sut of the 
chimney and the pure watered diamond which 
flashes in brilliancy from the bosom of the million- 
aire, but vast as seems the difference between them 
experts tell us they are one and the same thing, the 
diamond being but a vastly improved condition of 
coal sut! Sut! clay! porcelain! sapphire! opal! 
diamond !! these are the ascending steps. It is a long 



56 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

way from the dust to the diamond, but by the 
proper process it becomes a possibility in nature's 
realm for the lower to reach the brilliancy and worth 
of the higher. Who shall deny to the immortal 
soul, the same possibilities, accorded to inanimate 
objects lying at our feet, when retouched and re- 
inspired with the spirit of the Holy God. O ! Convert ! 
be encouraged in your noble beginning and reach up 
after " the likeness of Christ," for, though far away 
there in the sunshine are your highest aspirations, 
and though you can not reach them as yet, still, you 
can look up and see their beauty, believe in them, 
and try to follow where they lead, and, if even for 
the present you should be unsuccessful in scaling the 
boldest heights, or, securing the fullest realization of 
your heaven-born desires, yet, may you drink in 
consolation from the fact that you have grown in 
spiritual stature in your very effort to reach the 
higher mounts of God. 

We may say of the spiritual world what another 
has said of the natural : 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 57 

All things will yield to industry and time; 
None cease to rise, but those who cease to climb. 

Aim high, and your high aims will bring to you 
adornments, intellectual and spiritual, which gold is 
too poor to purchase, and gems that will shine with 
ever-increasing brilliancy in thy coronet when the 
sun shall cease to give his light. 

" Beloved ! now are we the sons of God, and it 
doth not yet appear what we shall he, but we know 
that when he shall appear we shall be like him, 
for we shall see him as he is." With such a 
promise, and such a prospect, who would not 
struggle On, and Up, stopping never, and saying 
ever, " I shall be satisfied (only) when I awake in 
thy likeness." 



58 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 




Forsake not the law of thy mother, for $ 
it shall be an ornament of grace unto thy 



8 HEAD AND CHAINS OF GOLD ABOUT THY NECK. 

Prov. 9 i :8-9 
8 



STEAY THOUGHTS. 59 



MOTHER'S TEAErSTAINED LETTER. 

I was rummaging through the attic. 'Twas not long ago, 

And there were piled a myriad things, some black, some white as 

snow. 
Some were beautiful crimson, a few were touched with gray, 
But colors did not hold my heart. 'Twas a serious tho'tful day. 

For I'd been thinking, thinking! for me 'twas strange, indeed, 
So seriously to contemplate the living and the dead, 
Yet some way, thought revolving, reminded of the past 
And made me think of the future, and what might be at last. 

Again and again I pondered this question, O ! how deep ! 
Till all uncalled the tears would start, I could not help but weep. 
My heart was almost bursting, for thoughts came up of yore 
When I bid farewell to mother and kissed her at the door. 

The words that then she uttered were carved upon my heart, 
And ever and anon for years, the tears, unasked, would start ; 
'Twas this sentence fell from mother's lips, ' ' Your refuge, dear, 

is God. 
Remember this, when years have flown, and I am 'neath the sod." 

For years I had been thoughtless, but could not be to-day; 
I thought of my Christian mother, who in distant graveyard lay. 
I recalled how she had kissed me and commended me above, 
Then quickly came her farewell words, "God is your refuge, 
love." 



60 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

Thus I rummaged thro' the attic. 'Mong the many things found 

there, 
Some were torn, and broken some, a few were rich and rare; 
But among that pile of rubbish, which long untouched had lain, 
Was a treasure found, a letter signed, with my sainted mother's 

name. 

I read it o'er and o'er that day, in the attic all alone, 
Till every line cut deep my heart and led me to the throne. 
I wept, I knelt, I prayed sincere that my refuge God would be, 
And lightning's flash came ne'er so quick, as his blessing came 
to me. 

'Twas her old and tear-stained letter! I knew my mother's hand. 
Through it I saw her face, her life, so pure, sublime, so grand ! 
Then I sang, " God is my refuge; my mother's God, my own! " 
O! my heart was " strangely warmed " that day in the attic all 
alone. 

O ! that precious tear-stained letter, to me its worth 's untold. 
There is naught on earth could purchase it, not pearls, nor mines 

of gold; 
For it brought anew the message from my mother 'neath the 

sod, 
And alone I there accepted my true refuge, Mother's God. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



61 



8 Prayer-moments spent with god are 

pearls strung for eternity. 




"Golden yials full of odours, which §> 
& are the prayers of saints." 



Rev., v: 8. $ 



62 STRAY THOUGHTS. 



PEATEE. 

James the inspired says, " The effectual fervent 
prayer of a righteous man availeth much." 

Who can correctly and fully define " Much " as 
found in this sentence ? How high does it ascend j 
How deep does it sink ? How far does it reach ? Can 
any one tell ? No 1 For there is no rule of measure- 
ment ! No standard of weights ! No set of testing 
scales by which the rich fullness of this word, in this 
connection can be decided. However, some little 
idea of its magnitude may be gathered by carefully 
studying the ever wonderful prayer-results of other 
days. 

Behold, the land of Israel ! it is one unbroken 
scene of drouth, dearth, and desolation. King 
Ahab's meadows are burned to a crisp. His royal 
gardens have withered under the scorching suns 
and rainless skies for three and a half years. No 
rain-fall has moistened the earth during all that 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 63 

time, and, the cattle of the royal stalls, and, the 
herds of the kingly fields are dying on a thousand 
hill-sides, and as the weary, worried, wicked King 
seeks relief for the famishing flocks, lo ! Elijah, the 
man of God, unexpectedly appears. Carmel's height 
is reached; the battle of the gods takes place; Elijah's 
prayer ascends and pierces the rain-filled clouds and 
unlocks the long-sealed heavens. " Behold, there is 
a sound of an abundance of rain," for the plea of the 
Tishbite has been offered and the promise of God 
fulfilled. 

Again ! Hezekiah receives a letter from the 
leader of the Sennacharibian host, and in it is 
pictured the former victories of this great foe, and 
most insolently does the letter close by derisively 
asking " Where is the King of Hamath ? And the 
King of Arphad? And the King of the city of 
Sepharvaim? Hena and Ivah? All these have I 
destroyed ! How then shalt thou be delivered ? 
Hezekiah knew the city was entirely surrounded by 
an almost innumerable host, and was aware that if 
the letters were read to the people, it would strike 



64 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

terror to every heart, for, they well knew, all the 

former conquests of this, their cruelly- wicked foe. 

How then could the king or his people expect to 

escape ! Is there a possibility ? Yes, for lo ! Heze- 

kiah, the praying-king, kneels at the altar of the 

Lord's house and prays, not long, nor loud, but 

sincerely, and thus by prayer, without sword, arrow, 

or glittering arms, turns the tide of battle against 

the taunting foe ! 

His petition has reached the heart of God, and, 

in response to that prayer, "the angel of the Lord 

went forth, and smote in the Assyrian camp, a 

hundred and fourscore and five thousand." And 

the sunlight of the succeeding morn fell upon as 

many corpses scattered o'er the plain! Most 

beautifully has "Lord Byron" woven into poetic 

stanza this heaven-sent-angel-slaughter-scene in the 

following lines : 

The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, 
And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold, 
And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea, 
When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Gallilee. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 65 

Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green, 
That host with their banners at sunset were seen; 
Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath flown, 
That host on the morrow lay withered and strown. 

For the angel of death spread his wings on the blast 
And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed, 
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill, 
And their hearts but once heaved and forever grew still. 

And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide, 
But through it there rolled not the breath of his pride, 
And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf, 
And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf. 

The widows of Ashur are loud in their wail, 
And the idols are broke in the temples of Baal, 
And the might of the gentile unsmote by the sword, 
Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord. 

The prayers of the righteous ! what wonders they 
have accomplished! By prayer, the sun-shade on 
the Dial-plate of Ahaz turns backward ten degrees I 
By prayer, three hundred war-chariots, and a thou- 
sand thousand armed Ethiopians flee from before pious 
and prayerful King Asa ! The Moon over Ajalon's 
valley, and the Sun over Gideon's height, halt in 
their circling march as the plea of Joshua ascends ! 
Yes! prayer brings heaven-kindled fires dripping 



66 STRAY THOUGGTS. 

from the firmament to burn the bullock, altar, and 
trenched-up waters of Mount Carmel. Evil-spirited 
sons were healed; Devil- vexed daughters were cured, 
Demon-possessed men were released; and Pente- 
costal-fires burned brilliantly after the ten-day- 
prayer-service in the upper room ! and as then, so : 

Nations, now, in a day are born 

By the prayers of faith at the altar's horn. 

Truly, the fervent effectual prayer is the pulsa- 
tion of a great and pious soul, for, he prays best, who 
lives best, and prays most frequently ! To become 
proficient and efficient in prayer, it is necessary that 
we follow the steps in this particular line which 
others have pursued to make themselves adepts in 
their line. In the life of every successful specialist 
four things may be noticed, sincerity, ambition, fre- 
quency and love. 

It was thus with Sir Isaac Newton who, from the 
falling apple, caught the idea of a great central, yet 
invisible force, which, when he had once firmty seized? 
never long allowed it to leave his mind, and gave 
himself no rest until he had searched out the laws by 



STEAY THOUGHTS. 67 

which the planets are guided through the skies. 
This he accomplished by spending long nights in a 
lofty tower, gazing continually at the heavenly 
bodies, and, with telescopic aid, going up among the 
stars, and tracking them in their orbits. For years 
he seemed to have forgotten the terrestrial in his 
keen desire to comprehend the celestial. Indeed, 
the greater part of his life was spent among the 
upper-world-glories, millions and millions of miles 
away. 

Persistent, patient, and pure, was Michael Angelo, 
the great Florentine sculptor, who was by far the 
ablest of his age, and who never dropped his chisel, 
till the cold marble was cut away and revealed in 
all its beauty the slumbering angel hidden there. 
Unceasingly, and untiringly he wrought in his work, 
for he was a man ever aiming at the highest ideal, 
and would never be satisfied till he had reached the 
perfection of his art. 

So prayer, more than science and art ever can, 
may become so absorbingly delightful and real that 
we shall rise above ordinary wandering thoughts, 



68 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

travel in spirit above the upper- worlds, and uncon- 
sciously grow eloquent while we speak " face to face 
with God." 

u Men ought always pray, and not faint/ 5 were 
the advisory words of Jesus, and no sooner does the 
sentence fall from his lips than he, himself, retires to 
a lonely mountain-side or summit, where " He con- 
tinued all night in prayer to God;" or, as in another 
instance, in order that he might be fully equipped 
and thoroughly armed for on-coming struggles " He 
rises a great while before day" to plead for needed 
assistance. 

The law of His soul was the very opposite of 
nature's law, for the gravitating of His heart- 
thoughts was ever upward, and His very being reached 
up after God as naturally as the trellised vinelet 
struggles upward for the kisses of the sun. His 
life was one incessant prayer ! Galilee and the grave 
of Lazarus heard the prayers of thanksgiving ! 
Jerusalem heard the prayer for strength to glorify 
his father; the upper-room echoed with his voice as 
he prayed for the disciples and all future converts ; 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 69 

the garden caught the thrice-repeated appeal for 
submission, and even on the cross there sprang to 
His lips the prayer of forgiveness for the murderers 
at his feet. Yes! and though eighteen centuries 
have rolled into the past since then, yet, grave and 
garden; Galilee and upper-room ; calvary and cross; 
all ! all ! ! send back the echo of His offered prayers. 
By address and action ; by parable and proverb ; by 
precept and example ; he crowds the conviction upon 
us that prayer is life's great necessity. He stands out 
alohe as the peerless pattern of persistent prayer by 
first consecrating the prayer-closet and the bended 
knee and by his own constant and uniform prayer- 
habits teaches men how to turn the desert into an 
altar of devotion and convert the crowded city into 
a religious retreat. 

In its influence and effects on the world such a 
prayer-life is as delightsome and refreshing as are 
the deep snow-wreaths and shady-clefts seen on the 
higher mountain of Britain, in the heat of a summer 
day. O ! Convert, as did thy master, so do thou 
weave into thy life, thread by thread, and, link by 



70 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

link, a golden chain of humble prayers and heaven- 
thoughts, for without prayer there can be no gen- 
uine Christian experience, and the degrees of your 
experience will strikingly correspond with the depth 
and heartiness of your prayer-life. The lark goes 
up singing, and the song grows in intensity, sweet- 
ness and melody, in proportion as it ascends towards 
the heavens, but, if the wing-motion cease, the song 
stops ; the melody dies ; and the songster settles 
straightway to the earth again. So, prayer is the 
wing-movement of the soul, it bears one heavenward! 
but if prayer cease, thy song is ended, joy is gone, 
and the down-drawing forces of sin will magnetize, 
grip, and drag back to the earth and its evils again, 
the soul, which had been attracted by the upper and 
heavenly forces. Prayer is the language of discov- 
ered want. It is the ascending voice of distress 
calling in a mightier one to aid in time of urgency 
and peril. Pray for yourself ; pray for others ; pray 
for all men ; and in your petitions think of prayer, 
not as an overcoming of God's reluctance to grant 
your desires, but think of it, as it is in fact, your 



STEAY THOUGHTS. 71 

weak faith at last comprehending and firmly grasp- 
ing the willingness and power of God. 

If at any time, there seems a hesitancy to respond, 
on the part of God, keep in mind that it is only a 
seeming hesitancy not a real unwillingness. 

There was no reluctance with God when Jacob 
wrestled " till the break of day ! " when Elijah prayed 
seven times ere the Carmel-shower came! nor when 
the plea of the Syro-Phoenician mother was tempo- 
rarily delayed. No ! It was to teach them, and the 
world through them, the possibilities of persistent 
prayer. 

Augustine most beautifully says, "When God 
sometimes seems to give tardily, he does not deny 
his gifts, but commends them, for things long desired 
are more sweet when obtained, and by their tempo- 
rary denial, faith ; patience ; and humility; are all 
called into exercise, for, by this means only, can it 
be shown, who will pray always and not faint. 

If God temporarily keeps locked the door of his 
treasure-house it is only that we may the more 
appreciate the treasures when given to us, and how- 



72 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

ever long the delay may seem to us the answer will 
come, for, the true suppliant is sure to triumph in 
the end, and carry away rejoicing the boon which 
he desired and which God was only waiting for the 
arrival of the proper moment to bestow. Olthat 
all might know the power of persistent and incess- 
ant prayer and receive answers even as did the Syro- 
Phoenician mother in behalf of her child, or, as the 
supplicating neighbor insisting that his friend shall 
rise and give him as many loaves as he needs for 
the sustenance of the mid-night and unexpected 
traveler, or, as the troublous widow prevailing with 
the unjust, self-confident and atheistic judge. 

These, and many more, scriptural incidents, force 
upon us the conviction, that, prayer is an almost 
unlimited-power when properly and persistently- 
applied. 

Secular, as well as religious records of the past, 
are ablaze with the triumphs secured by the men of 
prayer. Here, we can give but a single instance from 
mediaeval history. Gustavus Adolphus the courage- 
ous and beloved "snow-king of Sweden" was the 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 73 

trusted leader of his own armies, and with them 
swept on in one unbroken channel of success. Enemies 
were overwhelmed ; cities were taken ; and nations 
were conquered ; indeed, wherever his sword flashed 
in the sunlight victory seemed a certainty. With 
him it was one unbroken track of triumph even up 
to the hour when, " Wallenstien " faced him with 
forces full of intrigue, and numerically much the 
superior of his own, and against which he made the 
historic "dash of death, 5 ' which exposed him to a 
mortal wound, and from which he died breathing a 
" prayer of peace" for his family, and prosperity for 
his comrades. On the morning of that fatal Lutzen- 
Plain battle his whole army joined in the devotions 
of their king and commander, at the close of which 
devotions they broke forth singing in one loud paeon, 
Martin Luther's battle song " Eine feste burg est 
unser Gott." A German critic has said of Adolphus, 
" During his long career no low motive was ever 
revealed and no unworthy act ever sullied the bright- 
ness of his fame." Who of us will say, that, his 
unselfish devotion to his people, his bold-bravery in 



74 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

times of peril, his unsullied brightness of character^ 
his marvelous success, and his long, triumphant, and 
kingly career, was not due in large measure to his 
habits of devotion, his spirit of incessant prayer? 
As then, so now, communion with God transforms 
the character, polishes the countenance, and beauti- 
fies the entire man, physically, mentally and morally. 
The veiled face of Moses flamed with a heavenly 
brightness after his forty-day communion with God, 
on the law-Mount of Sinai. The countenance, 
thought and life of Saul were suddenly, marvelously, 
and beautifully changed, when there fell in floods 
upon him, the shadow of the master which was " a 
light brighter than noonday-sun," and ever after 
Jesus acknowledged him, giving as a final-and-con- 
vincing-proof of his discipleship and sincerity, " Be- 
hold ! he prayeth." And of Jesus Himself it is writ- 
ten, " He went up into the mountain to pray, and as 
he was praying the fashion of his countenance was 
altered and even his raiment became white and daz- 
zling " and so beautiful and desirable was that prayer- 
hour on the mountain-top, that three voices blended 
as one in saying, " It is good for us to be here." 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 75 

A prayer life is a satisfactory and successful life, 
but a prayerless life is full of defeat and sorrow. 
Ten thousand duties may be successfully performed 
if each is preceded by faithful prayer, but one single 
duty unattended by soul breathings, which are the 
language of discovered want, would only result in 
failure. 

O! Young convert, let prayer precede each day's 
service, in the store ; on the farm ; in the home ; on the 
train ; in the shop ; on the sea ; in the school-room ; or 
in the forest ; everywhere and every day look up to 
the directing eye, the guarding-hand, the protecting, 
power of the loving, all-wise and Omnipotent One. 

Said King David of Israel, " Morning, noon and 
night, will I pray unto Thee, O ! God," and this daily- 
thrice-repeated-prayer-custom of the royal psalmist, 
if carried on in the lives of every recent convert, would 
be an up-building element, the like of which, there 
has not yet been sufficient. 

Said Abraham Lincoln, "I have been driven 
many times to my knees, by the overwhelming con- 
viction, that T had nowhere else to go." 



76 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

Said Bishop Heber when dying, "All is loss now, 
save the hours I have spent with, and for, God." O ! 
May the above threefold-testimony of King, President 
and Bishop, help every young Christian to know the 
power and beauty of a prayerful-life, and may the 
reader conclude this prayer-chapter, as did the writer, 
by lifting the thought heavenward and saying : 

O! thou! by whom we came to God, 

The Life, the Truth, the Way, 
Thyself the path of prayer hath trod ; 

Lord! teach us how to pray. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 




8 THERE WAS LlGHT. 




God said, "Let there be Light/' and 





S " God is Light and in Him is no Dark- 

<l NESS AT ALL." 

8 Bible. 




78 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

GOD IS LIGHT 

Let there be light ! 

'Twas God's command! 
To earth and sea and sky and land 
And more than myriad flashing beams 
O'er all earth's chaos swiftly streams. 

Let there be light ! 

'Twas heard again! 
And o'er the hearts and minds of men 
Light flashed and blazed as brightest day 
And God disclosed, to men, his way. 

Let there be light ! 

Man's soul's aflame! 
Accepts, adores that wondrous name 
Which floods the universe with light, 
Yes; gives the soul new day, for night. 

Let there be light! 

May nations sing ! 
Light to mankind, we gladly bring 
Till as an over- whelming flood 
A world is bathed in Jesus' blood. 

Let there be light ! 

So shall it be! 
Till world on worlds our Saviour see 
And 'round God's — glory — circled throne 
The true light, gathered nations, own. 

Let there be light! 

No sooner said ! 
Than light shall stream o'er all the dead 
Then, they in Christ, who sleep, shall rise 
And live in light above the skies. 



STKAY THOUGHTS. 



79 



H A Good Kule of Life. 




John, ii:5. 



§ "Whatsoever He saith unto you, Do it!" 

Bible. 





"Without Mb ye can do nothing." 

JESUS. 



i 



80 STRAY THOUGHTS. 



WOKKERS WITH GOD. 

Apostolic declaration ! Inspired truth ! Ennobling 
thought ! creatures of earth priveleged and prevailed 
upon to join hand and heart with the God of 
Heaven, and thus united, redeem a world. Oh ! what 
exalted communion and co-labor is this! If he 
chose, God could have sent angel-messengers flaming 
with light and truth, absorbed in their contact with 
God and seraphic-spirits, to have wrapped every 
new-born babe in garments of light, guard it in its 
growing years, and all through its life breathed into 
its ears truths divine. Or, if he chose so to do, he 
could have compelled each soul to make quick and 
complete surrender, and thus have brought all into 
subjection, but, no, he chose rather, by the love- 
power to win a single soul to the cause of right, and 
by that one, another, and by that still another, until 
the world should be garnered for God by these Christ- 
like mortals, blessed, and helped, and hurried on, by 
a deep and burning love for the Saviour. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 81 

In the realms of grace as in all of nature, man 
and God are seen as eo- workers. In nature's fields, 
man plows, plants, and harrows, then, God sends the 
energizing forces to crowd up through soil; sand; and 
rock; the life of the seed planted, which seed devel- 
oping and multiplying as it rises teaches us by every 
inch of growth that as a result of co-work, divine 
and human it can furnish and return a hundredfold 
to a needy and expectant world. 

Again, man prepares his orchard soil, carefully 
places the rootlets of the tree, then leaves them to 
God, for man can do no more, his part is complete, 
and Now, God through nature, sends vitality to 
every twig, branch, and bough, soon the buds appear, 
these burst into blossoms, which fill the air with 
their fragrance for awhile, then drop off and down, 
to give place to fruit, abundant, lovely, large and 
luscious. 

Co- work in nature's realm has reached a result ! 
for tree, bud, blossom, fragrance and fruit, all is 
nature's gift from the hand of God, when tilled and 
tended by the hand of man ! O ! ye who are young 



82 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

" workers together with God " begin now to work in 
spiritual fields, there expecting as large a return as 
in nature-fields. Let your part be performed then: 

A mightier hand more skilled than thine 
Will hang the clusters on the vine 
And make the fields with harvest shine. 
Man can but work, God can create, 
But they who work, and watch, and wait 
Have their reward, tho' it seemeth late. 

In his well arranged labor system, God will not 
work without man, and man in his frailty and self- 
helplessness can not work without God. Man may 
furnish some labor, but, God only, can furnish mater- 
ial and forces, and so beautifully arranged are nature's 
plans that without the latter, the former would be 
useless. 

Man of necessity is dependent upon God ! God, 
voluntarily, is dependent upon man ! Thus God has 
linked these agencies and by them seeks to save a 
world, seeks earnestly to save all, yet as earnestly 
seeks to save one as if he were all. 

Wonder of wonders ! that in this world-redeeming 
work, man is a partaker and co-laborer with God ! 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 83 

God-Man, here is the hope of ultimate and universal 
success. Man working persistently, and yet, waiting 
patiently ; working as though God did nothing, yet, 
trustingly and confidingly waiting as though he did 
everything. It is with this thought uppermost in 
mind that Paul declares " I can do all things " but 
immediately modifies his statement, so full of confi- 
dence, by adding " through Christ who strengthen- 
ed me," for well did he know that a greater than he 
had said " Without me ye can do nothing." Not 
only Paul, but, indeed all the men and women of the 
past who have left the imprint of their lives upon 
the world's memory, have been those who considered 
their own weakness, and God's strength ; their own 
littleness and God's greatness, as they asked " Who 
is sufficient for these things " and quickly answered 
their own question by saying u Our sufficiency is of 
God." Martin Luther, who braved the anathemas 
of the Roman pontiff, and would have gone to the 
convened council of the enemy " though every tile 
on the very house-tops in the highway were a Devil, 
" never ascended the pulpit stairs to preach the word, 



84 STKAY THOUGHTS. 

and do th§ work of God, without trembling lips, and 
heart, and knees. John Wesley, the founder of 
Methodism, great, grand, and godly man, was often 
heard to say "A mote in the sun-beam is little, but in 
the presence of God I am infinitely less." 

Great men were they ! Yet great as they were 
they would attempt no task single-handed. 

They ever sought a double force, to labor success- 
fully in their double-work, of establishing truth and 
refuting errors, of building up the true, and, tearing 
down the false. 

With implicit confidence in the strength of God, 
and believing that, his presence, as in the life of 
Moses would be ever with them, they moved on as 
flaming swords of truth crying : 

My spirit yearns to bring 

Thy lost ones back — . Yearns with desires intense 
And struggles hard to wring the bolts apart 

And pluck thy captives thence . 

Paul may plant, an Apollos water, but God 
must give the increase, and this he will do, if our 
part is properly performed. To every trembling? 
honest heart, God reaches out an aiding hand, and 



STKAY THOUGHTS. 85 

with a voice of tender sympathy says : " Fear not, I 
will help thee, I the Lord thy God will hold thy 
right hand and thou shalt thresh the mountains and 
beat them small and shalt make the hills as chaff 
Yea, thou shalt fan them, and the wind shall carry 
them away, and the whirlwind shall scatter them, 
saith the Lord for I am with thee, yea, I, even I, will 
help thee." 

Who would not grow strong under the inspiration 
of such a promise ! It is not what talents or brilliant 
abilities men possess which turns the tide toward tri- 
umph, but, complete consecration and submission, 
which leads us to say as did Jonathan to his armour- 
bearer when they two alone were climbing up the 
sharp rocks of the Philistines' garrison : 

" Come, let us go over against these Philistines, 
the Lord will work for us, for there is no restraint 
to the Lord to save by many or by few." 

Going in such faith, no wonder the watchmen of 
Saul, looking out from the tower-top of Gibeah, 
said, in amazement, as he saw the enemy fall under 
the stroke of Jonathan's sword: " Behold, the 



/ 



86 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

multitude melteth away"; for, as these two young 
men of faith advanced, the touch and terror of God 
fell upon the garrisoned group, and in wild alarm 
they fled, or fought, and fell down slain, for " the 
Lord saved Israel that day ! ! " 

The record of the past is a long, loud voice, saying 
in unmistakable terms : " Know thou, that he hath 
set apart, him that is godly, for himself." David, 
with this truth as the basis of his strength, though 
only a ruddy-faced stripling of the sheep cote, may 
strike to earth's level a Goliath giant, who for forty 
days had been insolently offering a challenge to 
Israel's entire army. Behold ! majesty blazes from 
the brow of the boy as he advances toward the 
mail-coated champion of the plains,, and, with whirl- 
ing sling, cries out: "Thou comest to me with 
sword, and spear, and shield ; but, I come to thee in 
the name of the Lord of Hosts, the God of the 
armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied." 

Moses! weak, fearful, and stammering-tongued, 
may yet lead out, with cornet, cymbal and song, six 
hundred thousand bondmen into the liberty -land of 
promise. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 87 

Weeping Jeremiah, saying " Ah ! Lord, I am but a 
child," may yet hear heaven's encouraging response : 
" Say not ' I am a child,' for I the Lord will make 
thee a defenced city — a brazen wall — against thine 
enemies." 

Gideon ! trembling at the wheat-rock and saying 
to the call of God : " I am of the weakest tribe 
and of the poorest family," may yet separate and 
send home cowardly thousands, and with his remain- 
ing three hundred immortals, rout Philistine hordes. 
History's pages, secular and religious, are plainly 
marked with the finger-prints of God, and from them 
he who reads aright, may gather inspiration for the 
conflicts of coming years. 

Paris, the French capital, had been turned into a 
gigantic fortress under Louis Phillipe and Napoleon 
III. Its walls were thirty -three feet high and twenty 
miles in length. Within this enclosure were two 
millions of people, attempting to withstand a long 
and terrific siege of the enemy ; but so long have 
they been shut up that starvation is about to sweep 
them all into the grave, their provision supply being 



88 STKAY THOUGHTS. 

nearly exhausted. The outer channels of communi- 
cation are guarded, the telegraph lines have been 
cut, and to all human appearances, they must perish 
en masse unless relief speedily comes. Will it come ? 
Yes ! the smallest and most timid, under direction 
of a greater than itself, is yet to deliver all. The 
great war minister of Napoleon secures to the neck 
of a little carrier dove a ribboned-quill on which is 
photographed many thousand words. Lo ! it flies 
aloft, circling ever upward till out of danger's reach, 
then with surprising rapidity flies in straight lines 
to its destination, and delivers its message of relief. 
Paris was Saved ! Saved ! by a little dove, willingly 
working under the direction of a wiser than itself. 

No Christian, however young, timid, or unquali- 
fied, can longer plead lack of ability, nor can any 
infirmity be offered as a reason for failure in the 
performance of duty, for Paul, heroic Paul, takes 
from us such a possibility by saying : "I glory in 
mine infirmities that the power of Christ may rest 
upon me." 

In his unbounded confidence in God's omnipo- 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 89 

tence, his very weakness became strength, his infirm- 
ities new sources of power! He did not shrink 
despairingly within the compass of his own poor 
abilities, but, in his heart of faith embraced his cause 
and went forth under the inspiring force of his 
call, to apprehend that for which he was appre- 
hended. With one hand on the throne, let us with 
the other reach down and lift up a brother, the 
while breathing this sincere heart-prayer : 

Lord ! Strengthen us that while we stand 

Firm on the rock and strong in thee, 
We may stretch out a helping hand 

To wrestlers in the troubled sea. 

Thus strengthened and God-attended, naught but 
victory can ever come. No power can long obstruct 
the onward march of these combined efforts of God 
and man. 

Far easier would it be to tie the lightnings with 
a pack-thread! break the force of the whirlwind 
with the grip of your hand ! shatter the mountains 
with a single stroke ! still the sea by a single word ! or 
by your command stop the cyclone in its mad march 
of death and desolation! As these can not be done, 



90 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

no more can the combination of God and righteous 
men be permanently hindered in their ultimate and 
inevitable purpose or world conquest. 

O ! Converts of Christian truth, such possibilities 
in the moral and spiritual world are loud calls for 
systematic and united work, united each to other 
and all to God! Onward then shall be the movement 
over a rebellious world, for, the result of cowork, 
Divine-Human, must be a redeemed world in which 
shall be heard at no far distant day a song of victory 
far more significant than the shout of Achilles 
which rang out over the wind-swept plains of 
Ilium, more cheering than the harp and cymbal 
notes which fell from the fingers of Jewish maidens 
singing and leaping on Mediterranean shores as they 
saw Pharaoh's chariots and charioteers go tumbling 
into the sea I 

It is coming ! It is coming ! the golden period 
when " the earth shall be filled with the knowledge 
of God as the waters cover the sea ! " When no 
longer we shall need to say to our neighbor, " Know 
ye the Lord? " for all shall know him, from the least 



STUAY THOUGHTS. 91 

to the greatest. Yea, w Every knee shall bow, and 
every tongue confess that Jesus is the Christ to the 
glory of God, the Father." Yea, more ; when the 
universal shout shall ascend and lift the heavens in 
its upward sweep, proclaiming " The kingdoms of 
this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord 
and of his Christ." 

Do you ask when this glad day shall be ushered 
in ? Then, I answer, soon after the talents entrusted, 
whether one, two, or five, to the individual Christian 
shall have been utilized in spreading world-wide the 
spirit-touched truths of the Bible. 

This is the design of Christianity. In every 
recreated soul it should be as the breath of God 
blowing across the continents, refreshing dying souls, 
giving new life to millions and changing the world's 
atmosphere in general. 

From the heavens, comes to-day, the voice of 
Jesus, as impressively as it did to the divinely- 
arrested Saul on the Damascus Koad "Kise, stand 
upon thy feet, for I have appeared unto thee, for 
this purpose, to make thee a minister and a witness 
both of those things which thou hast seen, and of 



92 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

those things in which I will appear unto thee, 
delivering thee from the people unto whom now I 
send thee to open their eyes and to turn them from 
darkness to light, from the power of Satan unto the 
living God, that, they too, may receive forgiveness 
of sins and inheritance among them that are sancti- 
fied by faith in me." 

Look up ! and mark the movements of the sun ; 
behold ! it thrusts out its light-beams or fingerlets 
of fire, and draws to itself every wandering or 
motionless fog-cloud. See ! It stoops to kiss the 
mists and air-damp of a Spring-morning, then 
lifting it, as if to its own bosom, cleanses, clears, 
beautifies, and sends it back to earth, a rain-blessing, 
without which heaven-lift, and sun-kiss, it would 
have spread only dampness, desolation, malaria, and 
death. 

O ! Convert ! Full of the gospel thyself, thou canst 
go out with an over-running cup, whose over-flow 
shall fall on other thirsty souls, who, in turn, shall 
bless others with their recreated lives, and thus 
may you, working-with-God, originate rivers of 
Messing for all future years. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



93 







Nothing in man is good or great only 8 
as it is connected with God ! 



94 STRAY THOUGHTS. 



THE OLD MAN'S COUNSEL— " DON'T WAIT FOR 
LUCK." 

On a sunny street corner in a small village town 
Stood a raft of young men: boys, sitting down. 
Some laughing, some joking, some wondering why 
" Good luck, came so near them, yet, always passed by." 

A sire of seventy, who had years of success; 

Passing, heard the last words of the youthful address: 

" I'll teach them a lesson, 'twill help them," he said, 

That it's 'pluck' and not ' luck ' that will bring daily bread." 

With a face all resplendant — heart blithe and gay, 
He veered his intended course, went over their way, 
And with smile of a Christain, hand-clasp of a friend, 
He bid each his own life inspect, " consider its end." 

Quoth the old man of years (full three score and ten) 
"I'm right glad to see you, I am that, young men! 
There's a future before you, all radiant with light, 
If you serve God; and work hard; and, keep to the right." 

The aged-one passed on, but his counsel that day 

In the hearts of those lads was forever to stay; 

And do what they would, his advice to them stuck, 

" Look upward; go forward, boys; don't wait for luck." 

Oh! don't wait for luck to fall in your way, 
If you do, my young man, you'll wait many a day! 
Your teeth will all crumble — the snow on your locks — 
Will tell you, at last, that you've " struck on the rocks." 



STKAY THOUGHTS. 95 

No! don't wait for luck! get up like a man! 
Uproll your coat-sleeves — do what you can; 
Tip over the mossed-rocks — a treasure is there! 
Awaiting the one who has no time to spare." 

Luck comes to the one who goes in for the right; 
In spite of Apollyon's legions of night, 
To the willing — the active — not always most bright, 
But to him who sincerely goes into the fight. 

Luck! nonsense; there is but little of that; 
Luck- trusters, fear pigmies, scare at a gnat, 
They work not; nor think; nor labor alate; 
Poor simples! for luck look, do nothing but wait. 

Oh! youth of our country! Arouse ye, like men! 

Find work! then at it — eight hours or ten — 

Then you'll succeed! You're sure to have luck 

That some wish for — but have not — they haven't the pluck. 

There are many luck wishers standing idly around; 

At their feet is a fortune— down deep in the ground — 

But 'twill never be theirs — they haven't the pluck — 

Nor the nerve, nor the manhood — " They're waiting for luck/ 

Oh! quick, break the snare, lest, thee it destroy! 
You may yet rise to greatness, if you'll try it, my boy ! 
You will reach it alone, with Work, Goodness, and Pluck, 
But you'll miss it, while standing round, "Waiting For 
Luck! " 



96 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 




"The works of God are ceaseless, yet S 

M EVER SILENT ! So ALL THE MIGHTIER NATURE- $ 
^ FORCES: GRAVITATION"; SUN-LIGHT; COLD; HEAT; S 

^ $ 

ft electricity; are everywhere felt, but, no- m 



^ WHERE HEARD! THEY, TOO, WORK IN SILENCE. 




AN INFLUENCE NOT ONLY LIVES FOREVER, 



^ *^, -.^-.-^w—^^— — W* V^,^ A ^»™ *-w«— .*.— , w 

tt BUT, KEEPS ON GROWING AS LONG AS IT LIVES. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 97 



SILENT FOECES. 

The silent forces of the universe are many and 
most potent ! The sun ! that moulds the lily, paints 
the violet, and spreads the vari-hued tints upon the 
flowers of the earth ; the Sun, that drives his golden 
chariot through the skies, and flings his beams far 
across the shoreless sea of stars and floating systems ; 
the Sun that strips the snow-mantles from every 
mountain-top, pushes back the ice-bolts from every 
frozen stream, flings new life each spring-time over 
farm, field and forest, and melts all nature into 
beauty ; the Sun, that has kissed the ocean for ages, 
and filled the rain-ciouds with the dew from its lips, 
that has piled together enormous coal-fields in cen- 
turies past for use in years to come ; the Sun, whose 
going forth is "from the end of the heavens, and his 
circuit unto the ends of it " going everywhere, and 
influencing everything, and from whose heat there 
is nothing hid, evidencing itself to be the most 



98 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

powerful of all the natural forces is, yet, always 
silent, in its ceaseless and circling march. 

Much as it has accomplished, long as it has 
labored, marvelous as are its forces, no human ear 
has ever caught the echo of its falling footstep ! 
Silently, as the fabled-gods whose feet were shod 
with wool, it has moved in majestic tread, accom- 
plishing, with its silent sunshine in one day, what a 
million men could not do in a lifetime. Silently it 
has touched, inspired, and kindled into a glow every- 
thing in all the ages gone, and in silence it will 
continue to revolve and radiate its beams of light 
and heat until the universal conflagration shall do 
away with sun 5 moon, and stars, yes, all the worlds 
of light. 

In silence, too, comes the snow-fall, for, the 
heaviest snow-storm that ever locked the wheels 
of commerce, however thick it came, however high 
it piled, however dense it packed, was but the gath- 
ered force of frozen moisture, a collection of minute 
crystals, an aggregation of six-pointed snow-stars, 
falling one by one in silence, which with its silent but 



STEAY THOUGHTS. 99 

irresistible grip-lock, bound the polar and temperate 
zones. JSIoisebssly they came; trembling; flying; 
falling ; till the earth was covered with a mantle of 
white, from which there went dripping invisible 
forces which made possible the future development 
of the sleeping forms beneath the winter's snow, so 
that at the first warm breath of springtime every 
root and bulb sent up its blade and flower even as 
by enchantment. 

So, too, in silence is the labor of the frost ! A 
great rock, upon which have fallen a hundred pon- 
derous hammers without leaving a single dent or 
impression, is shattered, broken, and crumbled to 
dust, by that silent, yet seemingly semi-omnipotent 
frost-fo^ce which stealthily creeps into the narrow- 
est crevice of that same dentless rock, and under the 
touch of a sunbeam, expands itself and seeks release, 
and splits the rock asunder. 

Thus, again and again, is each piece broken until 
more than a myriad atoms lying all around, in 
splendid confusion, teach us that the silent force of 
a single frost-crystal, blended with the sunbeam's 



100 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

kiss, can accomplish, what a hundred hammers can not 
So too ! growing life in nature's fields, is an invisible, 
powerful, yet silent force. In its seasons, all nature 
grows, and grows continually. The tiny acorn be- 
comes a mighty oak ! the little seed, a wide-branching 
shrub I The tender sapling, a hardy tree ! a few kernels 
of corn multiply to millions! and a handful of wheat 
fills the bushel! In "March," winter's chill is still hold- 
ing fast all nature, in " May," farm, field and forest, 
alike have robed themselves in their new-spring-gar 
ments, and the very leaves of the trees seem to clap 
their hands for joy. This wonderful, yet, silent 
energy thrills all nature with life, and forces new 
vitality into every root ; blade ; twig ; and leaf, yet, in 
all this marvelous and incessant transformation, not 
a sound has been heard, all has been performed in 
perfect silence I 

Disease and death are the silent twin messengers 
of desolation ! Witness the passover night when the 
door of wrath swung open wide, and the avenging 
angel unsheathed and outdrew its flashing sword- 
Heaven and earth, alike, were hushed, and amid the 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 101 

dread silence the stroke of judgment fell and in all 
Egypt " there was not a house where there was not 
one dead." 

Kapid and ruinous as was the flight of the angel, 
no one of all the universe heard the tread of its foot- 
falls, nor, even the rustle of its unfolding wings as 
it poised and plumed for its returning flight. In 
silence it came, in silence it went. 

The terrific results of the London plague, and the 
serpentine silence with which this death-monster 
moved along its pathway, is thus graphically told in 
secular history. 

"Noiselessly, the plague traveled over a third 
part of the whole earth, like the shadow of an eclipse, 
as if some dreadful thing had interposed between 
the sun and the world. At that epoch there was the 
silence of death, and all London was dumb as a 
church-yard. Its touch was a silent hand pointing to 
the grave. The very sight of the infected was 
deadly. Its symptoms came so silently, yet so sud- 
den, that families seated in happiness at their meals 
saw the plague-spot begin to redden, and wildly scat- 



102 STKAY THOUGHTS, 

tered themselves forever. Mothers, when they saw 
the sign of infection on the babes at their bosom, cast 
them from them and fled away. Some went into ships 
and anchored far out on the waters, thereby hoping 
to get beyond its reach, but the vial-emptying angel 
had a foot on the sea as well as on the land, and 
none could flv that it could not overtake. It was as 
if heaven had repented the making of mankind and 
was silently shoveling them all into the sepulcher. 
Justice was forgotten and her courts deserted. The 
grass grew in the market-places. The rooks and the 
ravens built their nests in the mute belfries. All 
commerce was in coffins and in shrouds. Horses 
perished of famine in their stalls while whinnering 
for their dead masters to come and feed them. Old 
friends, meeting on the highway only looked at one 
another, and passed on in silence. Little children 
wandered up and down the streets in amaze, or filled 
the corners as they fell in the weakness and silence 
of death ! a silence unbroken for many a day ! O I 
what powerful invisible, forces! yet all these snow! 
sun! frost! field-life! disease, and death, however 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 103 

potent, are silent forces whose results are seen, but 
whose movements are all unheard. So too! there 
are mighty forces in the moral world, equally as 
active, powerful, and silent; one of which is, the 
silent influence of " Personal Character." 

Who can calculate its power, or by what means 
can we correctly measure it ? Here is a force by 
which a child may set in motion machinery which, 
once started, a giant's hand can not stop ! Character 
is a mighty force in the world. Character is the 
measure of a man's power and possibilities in the 
plans and works of God for the world. Froude, 
writing of the aroused and consecrated man of char- 
acter who is fairly devoted to the right, says : " In 
such a condition a man becomes magnetic." Per- 
sonal character ! It is a silent " effluence which is 
continually radiating from every life, and most of 
all when one is the least conscious of it. Influence 
is immortal ! ! Once born it never dies ! ! Lessons 
learned from nature's wide domain are often rich, 
and sometimes linger long, though expressed in 
language of our own choosing. Such is the follow- 



104 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

ing lesson learned while riding up " Chesapeake 
Bay " with moonlight splendour-robes wrapping it in 
folds of beauty : 

'T was night on the Bay; 

All was splendor ! 

A myriad star-gems twinkled and flashed 

Like laughing eyes of merry child. 

The night-queen shone 

In her richest garb, and flung o'er 

Chesapeake's waters, 

A mantle of light, which to us 

Revealed nature's beauties, a thousand, before unseen. 

The palatial steamer on which we rode and 

Over whose gunwale we leaned and looked, 

Ploughed in the deep waters a path; and left 

Behind, a track of troubled sea, 

A track, not wide at first, but wider, wider grew 

As on, and on, the steamer moved, until ! at length, 

So wide had grown ! in time so short ! 
It either strand had touched ! ! 

So ! thought I, it is with life's influence. 

Passing across life's great sea, 

We touch ! and touching, leave our impress ! 
This track of influence, though narrow at first; 
Ever widens as the years roll on ! Till 
Far back in the centuries; so broad hath grown, 
That, remotest time and space, are, in measure, molded by it, for 

good or ill ! ! 



STEAY THOUGHTS. 105 

O ! the silent force of a single soul ! 

When shall we learn the fullness of power wrapped up in thee ? 
Thou ! silent spirit, called influence; whither goest thou ? 
A response is heard, not aloud, saying: 
" Whither thou goest, I go ! 

As shadow follows substance, 

So will I ever follow thee ! Save when 

Thou diest, I die not ! 

I, thine influence, will live on, and on, and ON, 
FOREVER ! " 

Dean Stanley, in a public address, said, concerning 
Arnold, of Kugby fame, his early and devoted 
teacher : " The lapse of years has only served to 
deepen the conviction in my mind, that, no gift can 
be more valuable to the young than the inspiration 
of a great character, working on our own." 

Wrapped up in the character of the present are 
the characters of the future ; for the myriad little 
words ; ways ; and deeds imbed themselves in every 
character now touched by them. As in the rain- 
drops are found the nucleus of the mighty ocean ; as 
in the silently falling snow-flakes is hidden the vast 
avalanche ; as in the little bud upon the vine is 
wrapped the air-filling perfume ; so, in each life, 
however lowly or silent, are hidden forces, that must 



106 STKAY THOUGHTS. 

eventually and inevitably effect to some degree all 
with whom they come in contact. How long we 
live ! If not in our own life, then in the lives of 
others ! 

A young man away from home slept in the same 
room with another young man, a stranger. Before 
retiring for the night, he knelt down, as was his cus- 
tom and silently prayed ! His stranger room-mate 
had long resisted the Spirit's call, but, this nobly-brave 
example of the young stranger aroused him, and he 
soon after gave himself to Christ. 

He never met that praying-youth again, but, in 
old age, after having preached the gospel with un- 
usual power and success, he w r as heard to say 
"Nearly half a century has rolled away, and I have 
forgotten a multitude of events since then. But, 
that little room, that little couch, that silent-pray- 
ing-stranger-youth, are- still fresh in mind and can 
never be forgotten, even, amid the splendours of the 
glory-world." It was that simple act of common 
faithfulness, unostentatious, and silent, from which 
there went out an unconscious force, that, gave to 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 107 

the church a minister of rare power and value, and 
to the world, a sympathetic Christian friend. 

Followers of Jesus ! chisel deep in your minds this 
one fact, that, your individual life has a silent force 
which reaches out into the future, and, in a measure 
moulds and fashions the destinies of uncounted thou- 
sands. O ! ' Tis an arousing, soul-thrilling stanza* 
brilliant-with-truth which declares: 

"We are living, we are dwelling" 
In a grand and awful time, 
In an age on ages telling, 
" To be living is sublime." 

As the tuberose silently exudes its rich perfume ; 
as the stars let fall upon us their mantle of tender- 
ness and quiet ; as the seasons change ; and, come 
and go, altering in their silent steady march, the 
face of the natural world ; so, a devotedly-pious-life* 
silently ; steadily ; inevitably ; changes the face of 
the moral world! What " Bryant " in his " Leggett 
Memorial " says of his friend, is true of all men 
everywhere, so far as life's influence is concerned: 



108 STRAY 'iliOUGuTS. 

" The words of fire that from his pen 
Were flung upon the printed page 
Still move! Still shake! the hearts of men 
Amid a cold and coward age." 

It is declared to be impossible " to bind the sweet 
influences of the pleiades," so, we affirm it is equally 
impossible to limit, arrest, or destroy, the silent-forces 
incessantly operating in, and radiating from the life 
of a Godly man, for : 

Such life as his can ne'er be lost, 

It blends with unborn blood, 
And through the ceaseless flow of years 

Moves with the mighty flood; 
His life is our's, he lives in us, 

We feel the potent thrill, 
And through the coming centuries 

The world shall feel it still. 

O ! Convert of Christ, remember the silent forces 
that incessantly and invisibly radiate from thy new 
life, and act henceforth as though the good of all the 
world hung upon your influence ! 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



10& 



«e88teO8O8O8O0OeO8O8O8O88eO88BeBK)39K»» 



m The night is dark and pain weighs heavily, 
But God will hold His world above 

DESPAIR. 

Look to the East ! ! where up the lucid sky 
The morning climbs ! ! The day shall yet 



BE FAIR I 



'Celia Thaxter. 



" Who is there among you that feareth & 
the Lord, that walketh in darkness, and m 
hath no light? let him trust in the name gj 
of the Lord, and stay upon his God." 

Isa.,l:10. I 



110 STRAY THOUGHTS. 



DARKNESS DISPELLED BY DAWN-DIVINE. 

How strange is life ! 'Tis so ; not seems ! 
'Tis full of castles, full of dreams, 

That realized are never ! 
We crowd our thoughts with many a plan 
Work hard for God; work long for man; 

Yet disappointed ever! 

We thought! and that not long ago, 
That all seed sown would surely grow 

Watered by God's own hand! 
Why, then, this long, this sad delay, 
This holding back, from day-to-day 
The harvest from our land? 

Oh ! heart, you put me now to task, 
For deeper questioD none can ask 

Than you have asked of me! 
What! Why is your life thus and so? 
Why this change? That? I can not know; 

God alone can see! 

And see he does, the works of man, 
He knows their every thought and plan, 

Their every true endeavor! 
And what you "ken" so darkly now, 
To it, in years, you'll gladly bow; 

Yea! doubt again you'll never! 



STRAY THOUGHTS. Ill 

Then trust hirn, heart! hath he not said 
"Sure is thy water, Sure thy bread, 

The harvest shall not fail!" 
Ah! in due season, God's good time, 
There'll be a reaping! grand! sublime! 

That you will gladly hail! 
That reaping time will be for you, 
A gathering of the small, the few, 

That you had thought were lost! 
Thy God knew better; that, by thee, sownj 
By him, was garnered near the throne, 

He counted all the cost! 



112 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 




1 "I LONG TO HAND A FULL CUP OP HAPPI- 

ES 

$ NESS TO EVERY HUMAN BEING. 




! TO BRING SOME DROPS OF JOY TO HEARTS 

m 

m ALL CRUSHED WITH GRIEF. 



ft 




STRAY THOUGHTS. 113 



JOY BEINGEKS. 

Light ! Sunshine ! Gladness ! Joy ! What a 
quartette of rich and ringing words are these ! Oh ! 
glorious thought, that as Christians we may possess 
these in fact, and in all their fullness. Do you ask 
how ? Then I answer in Bible-language, by walking 
with God ; " in whose presence there is fullness of 
joy, and at whose right hand there are pleasures 
forever more." This is the only way in which true 
joy, desirable, and permanent, can be secured. There 
is but one avenue to Joy-land, and that is purity of 
purpose ; holiness of heart : and a certain degree of 
God-likeness in character. This statement is 
confirmed by an investigation of experience, in 
by-gone ages, and, among former peoples. Beve- 
lation, too, upholds this declaration, in all its 
myriad-numbered, and brill iant-hued sentences, 
which, like hand-guides, point to the paths, which 
leads to peace, joy, and gladness. Listen ! as it 
says ; " Let the righteous be glad ! Let the hearty 



114 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

of them that seek the Lord rejoice ! Let all such, 
exceedingly rejoice, before the Lord ! " Says David: 
u I wil] greatly rejoice m. the Lord ; my soul shall be 
joyful in my God, for, He hath clothed me with 
the garments of his salvation, He hath covered 
me with the robe of His righteousness. " It is only 
the righteous soul, seeking in sincerity the way 
of truth, that has joy unalloyed, unmixed, and 
unattended with future grief. 

The moral condition of the soul determines the 
quality and quantity of life's joys. Here is the much, 
desired and long-sought fount of real happiness- 
and he only is brave enough to stoop and drink of 
its crystal flow, whose heart is right with God. 
Gold, position, or the shallow-ceremonies of the 
worldling, can not buy, bribe or barter for it ! It is 
that which comes, and comes to stay, in every truly 
consecrated soul. To such a soul, and to such only, 
is the privilege given to "rejoice, rejoice always, 
and KEJOICE FOKEVEKMOKE." 

Eeal heaven- born gladness is not the result of 
temporal prosperity, nor, does it depend upon 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 115 

external sources for its continuance. It is the out- 
flow of inner blessings, rather than the inflow of outer 
blessings. Though every external comfort be swept 
away, still, may the true man-of-God say, in the 
language of the prophet Habakkak, "Although, the 
fig-tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in 
the vine ; the labor of the olive shall fail, and the 
field shall yield no meat, the flock shall be cut off 
from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stall, 
yet, I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God 
of my Salvation. " Doubtless, there are many, who 
by careless word, thought, or deed, stand in their ow r n 
sunshine, and though they may be unconscious of it, 
dim, too, the glory-light that, otherwise, would 
mantle-w r ith-splendor, the lives of men near them. 
Instead of a countenance blazing with the beauties 
of a devoted life, and flashing like the sun-king in 
his undimmed brightness, there is seen, alas ! in too 
many, a defect ; a defilement ; a deformity ; which 
drives away the sun-light of the upper-world, and 
leaves only earth's icicles piercing and chilling the 
unsanctified heart. 



116 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

The design of God, in all ages, has been to have 
a joyous people, and to this purpose adequate provi- 
sion has been made. Here are, " "Wells of Sal- 
vation, from which water may be drawn with joy." 
Here too, are, " words spoken, that our joy might be 
full." Yea ! more, God himself undertakes the task 
by declaring " I will make thee an eternal excellency, 
a joy of many generations. Live! Look ! listen! and 
in the hush of thy holiest meditations thou wilt hear 
God saying, " I have put my spirit upon thee, and, 
with this spirit thou mayest comfort all that mourn ; 
give unto them beauty for ashes ; the oil of joy for 
mourning ; and the garment of praise, for the spirit 
of heaviness : " O ! Convert of Christ, rise in the splen- 
dors of thy new-born life! ascend from height to 
height, from summit to summit, and drink thou from 
the down-flowing " rivers of God's pleasure," and as 
you drink, remember, a world of unquenched grief 
is at your side, pleading with out-streached hands for 
some little ray of sunshine, reflected, from the lives 
of you, who by faith, should dwell so near the throne 
of inaccessible light and glory. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 117 

There is a vast procession of weary human-beings, 
traveling around the earth in a vain search for joy, 
when the only perfect means of joy is just at their 
hands. 

Hundreds, there are, who imagine that somewhere 
over the mountains or beyond the sea is the object 
of their quest, and thither they go, only to find that 
they have but gone in vain. 

True abiding joy is secured, not so much from 
distant scenes, or the use of other means, as in the 
faithful, humble, cheerful use of the means we have, 
in the place we are. 

To da the plain duty of the moment, quickly ; 
cheerfully ; this will materially aid in bringing the 
joy we so anxiously seek. 

Perhaps, no greater mistake is made, and more 
frequently, than the one of expecting, at some other 
time, in some other place, or under some other cir- 
cumstances than those by which we are now sur- 
rounded, the rich, deep, and full joy we so much 
desire. 

How often we witness the experience-repetition 



118 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

of the mistaken lad, who having heard that a four- 
leaf clover, always brought joy and good fortune, 
and, that, with one in his possession, he would be 
successful and perfectly happy ;' started out to find 
this all-desirable talisman. 

He traveled over many countries ; climbed many 
mountains; crossed continents and seas; but, alas, it 
was all in vain. Wearied at last with his life-long 
and luckless search, he returned, in disappointed old 
age, to his boyhood home, to die ! when, as he came 
up the familiar path-way of his childhood home, lo ! 
there, close beside the doorstep grew a four-leaf 
clover! then, he learned, but alas ! too late, that he 
might have found at his very door, in life's start, what 
he found not in a life's travel and weary search. 

Young Christian-disciple ! seek your joys in God, 
and present surroundings, and, if faithful in the per- 
formance of known duty, however small it may 
appear, you will find them! 

Be not selfish in your search for joy ! for, a selfish 
soul can no more be happy than a rose could be 
beautiful without color or fragrant without perfume. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 119 

Paradoxical as it may seem, to give is to get ! and 
the way to increase our own joy, is to share that we 
have with others! See! the flowers scatter their 
fragrance and yet are none the less sweet ! the stars 
drop down upon us their mantles of brightness and 
yet are none the less brilliant ! The birds fill the air 
with their song, yet, is their warbling none the less 
sweet, nor their trills less melodious ! God gives to 
them as they give to others ! and what is true of 
flowers, star, and bird of song, is true of joyous souls. 
" I cannot relish a happiness which no one shares in 
but myself," so, said a certain noble emperor, and 
the very sentence glows with the grandeur of true 
greatness ! Let Christian souls everywhere be not 
only joy-getters, but also joy-bringers. Let grace in 
their hearts be as ointment in their hands, the fra- 
grance of which can not be concealed, but naturally 
scatters itself, and reaches all who are near. Give to 
others a portion of that " joy-unspeakable and full- 
of -glory" which God has given to you. 

" Christ's great design," says Baxter, "was to save 
men from their sins," but he delighted also to save 



120 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

them from their sorrows. Everywhere and at all 
times, he sought to turn tears into smiles, and to make 
his presence so cheering and helpful that mourning 
hearts would rejoice at the echo of his foot-fall. 
Indeed, the climax of his splendid life is reached 
when it is written, " He went about doing good," 
for thus he ameliorated the temporal evils of 
humanity; sent rays of sunshine into comfortless 
homes ; and spanned the horizon of every observer 
with the rainbow of joyful hope. 

O ! to be like him a heavenly voice, bearing to the 
world the joy of God ; a voice ! which shall ever keep 
this joy ringing in the ears and the hearts of men, 
like the music of an everlasting chime, and this we 
may do if we keep our hearts and lives, full of cheer- 
ful, Christian song. 

An Italian poet once asked " Haydn," the great 
Christian composer, how it happened that his church 
music was always of an animating, cheerful and even 
gay description. Haydn replied, "I can not make it 
otherwise! I write according to the thoughts I 
feel; and when I think of God, my heart is so full of 



STEAY THOUGHTS. 121 

joy, that notes dance and leap from my pen ! I 
serve him with a cheerful spirit ; I have a gladsome 
heart; and therefore, give to others a cheerful song." 
Joy would come to many a heart, now filled with 
grief, if the grief-stricken would seek to comfort 
others. Their very tears of sadness would be spark- 
ling gems to make the joy-rays brighter, for, though 
we can not explain why, yet, it is a fact, that those 
hearts which have suffered the most sadness, bring 
the most joy to others. Perhaps, it is sympathy 
springing from a similarity of sorrows, or, possibly, 
God has designed that those hearts, which have less 
apparent joy for themselves, shall bear the more real 
joy to others. The crushing sorrows of some lives 
have been the means of breaking open fountains of 
joy for others, for it is with the heart, as with the 
geranium, always sweet, but seldom so fragrant as 
when bruised and crushed. Never was diviner music 
heard by mortal ears than when Seraphic Spirits sang 
over the Bethlehem hill-tops on that first Christmas 
night, " We bring you good tidings of great joy." 
More cheering words were never uttered than 



122 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

those which the angels then dropped into the ears of 
the affrighted shepherds, yet all this joy and good 
cheer were to come through the suffering of Him who 
is pathetically described as " a man of sorrows and 
acquainted with grief." O ! Yes ! it may be ; yes t 

It is a truth beyond our ken, 
Yet 'tis a truth which all may read; 

It is with roses as with men, 
The sweetest hearts are those that bleed. 

John, the Revelator, says, "I looked, and, lo ! an 
angel, standing in the sun." To see an angel is to 
behold beauty and splendour ! To see an angel stand- 
ing in the sun, is to witness, beauty, and splendor, 
aflame: surely, from such a being in such a place 
fell many a brightening ray ! 

Converts ! Ye are not angels, nor, can ye stand in 
the sun, but ye are Christains, and ye may shine 
gloriously, for, " Your light is come and the glory 
of God is risen upon you," and at your joyous-wel- 
come, " Gentiles will come to thy light, and kings 
to the brightness of thy rising." Oh ! That by 
strong lives, and sterling characters, ye may be 
heaven-lit souls bearing to the struggling millions 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 123 

with whom you come in contact, in your upward 
march, the light-and-joy-rays of a better world! 
Let prayer and song be wrapped in the folds of a 
sun-light experience, then, will your cheerful words 
produce their image in the souls of men, and a beauti- 
ful image it will be. 

Young converts ! you have often been refreshed 
by the presence of cheerful christian persons, and 
why not you, like them, be always cheerful yourself 
and thus confer refreshing pleasure upon others. 
In order to do this, seize on the fragments of happi- 
ness that lie all about you. I say " fragments of 
happiness " for after all, happiness like gold, is 
of tener found in minute particles, than large and 
weighty nuggets. 

If you would be happy, and, cause others so to 
be, you must u gather up the fragments ! " Seconds, 
are but little dots-of-time, yet, combine a sufficient 
number of those small time-dots, and they make an 
hour; a day; a week; a month; a year! Yea! a 
whole life-time ! The sources of happiness may be 
small, but, they are numerous, and it is yours to 



124 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

draft these particles of sunshine into your life, and, 
thus gather a vast amount of joy for your own and 
other pathways. 

Let us watch that no single ray of joy ever evade 
our grasp, then will hearts be helped in their struggle 
with the problem of life, and we shall not grieve for 
the golden-moments slipped away. It would, indeed, 
be a sad finality, to go to the grave, and feel at life's 
close, unconscious of ever having diminished one 
drop of human sorrow, or, made happier, a single 
one, of the world's-myriad-aching-hearts. Through 
grace there are souls which have the gift of finding 
joy everywhere and carrying it with them to scatter 
it wherever they go. 

Joy gushes from under their fingers like jets of 
light! 

Their very influence is an inevitable gladdening 
of the heart ! They give light without meaning to 
shine, and, surely, such bright hearts have a great 
work to do for God. A young girl in a certain 
Western citv, was one of the loveliest characters that 
ever bloomed on earth. She was everybody's friend, 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 125 

and everybody's favorite. She moved among them 
like a flood of gold en-light, scattering joy at every step, 
and radiating it with the utterance of every word. 
She was not what the world calls handsome, but> 
rather, she was of common appearance. Indeed, 
the lineaments of her face were such, that, had it 
not been for the inner-sunshine which flashed its 
light-beams, to lip, eye. face, and brow, and over all 
wreathed smiles of heavenly sweetness, she would 
have been called homely, but, that tender, never- 
forced, graceful, christian smile, won every heart, so 
that it was no uncommon thing to hear people say 
as they left her presence "What a beautiful girl 
Annella is," and, such she was in her brilliant char- 
acter. Yea! doubly-brilliant because she lived in 
thought and purpose so near the gates of God, that 
light celestial fell upon her soul and reflected itself 
upon others. 

The secret of her beautifully resplendant and 
cheerful disposition was this. She always wore about 
her neck, a little sacred locket which none but her- 
self was ever allowed to open. None ever knew 



126 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

what it contained until one day she was striken down 
with a dangerous illness from which her physician 
declared she could never recover. When this news 
was borne to her she permitted her young Christian 
friend sitting beside her to open the locket, and 
there written with the beautiful pen-touch of 
"Annella" were the words, "Of to he like Christ, 
whom hawing not seen I love" That hidden away, 
but incessant prayer was the secret of her handsome, 
sun-like, majestic and cheerful Christian life. 

By her incessant desire and purpose to be like 
Christ she had been changed into the glorious image 
of Him, who bore in His own spiritual being, joys 
enough to fill a world. Ye too, may receive the 
Christ-life into your hearts and, if not hindered by a 
wrong spirit, or unholy deed, will work its way out 
through the crust of your lives, and fall as song and 
sun on all around. We may not all be Heaven-inspired 
songsters to thrill vast audiences with melody's 
charm, but we may have heart-hid the " Joy of God" 
which is " unspeakable and full of glory," and thus 
he a song; a poem; a light beam; a sun ray; to the 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 127 

world. Far better is this than all the accomplish- 
ments of art, music and melody, if these be unsanc- 
tified and consecrated, for, though from our lips 
there fall not a single note, rhyme or poetic gem, 
yet, we may he a song, a music of God's own making 
and this is an almost ideal state, for as one hath said : 

Tis better to have the poet's heart than brain; 
Feeling; than song; but, better far than both 
To be a song — A music of God's making. 

Go thou ! youthful follower of the Nazarene, and 
gather sunshine from the gates of God, then, let the 
beauteous rays of thy heaven-born life, break through 
the gathering gloom of others' pathways. Would 
you accomplish this ? Then, you must ascend the 
spiritual mount of transfiguration and there abide 
till thy heart is " white as no fuller can white it," 
and, with this flood of purity, light; and joy; still 
bathing head; brow; hand ; and heart; go down the 
mountain-side, and, divide thy fullness of joy, with a 
world all crushed in grief. The thornless rose 
blooms, and, scatters its aromatic gifts on the snow- 
clad and frozen summit of the Oriental Highlands, 



128 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

so you Christian ! from thy high and heaven-kindled 
life filled with the perfume of purity may scatter 
sweetness and joy in this grief -shrouded world, and 
when the present universe recedes from your sight, 
a new world will break upon your vision, and, with 
heaven's gold; crown; harp; pearl; pilgrim; and throne 
rising in its splendid magnificence before you, yon 
shall hear the throne occupant, Jesus ! the joy-giver, 
say "Well done, good, faithful servant, enter thou 
into the JOT OF THY LOKD." 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



129 




"Honor the Lord with thy substance 




AND WITH THE FIRST-FRUITS OF ALL THINE IN- $ 
I CREASE, SO SHALL THY BARNS RE FILLED WITH 
M PLENTY, AND THY PRESSES SHALL BURST OUT 



$ WITH NEW WINE. 





Therefore, as ye abound in everything, g 
g IN faith, and utterance, and knowledge, & 

Of AND IN ALL DILIGENCE, SEE THAT YE ABOUND IN $ 



THIS GRACE ALSO. 



II. Cor., viii:7. 



130 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

OUR CHAPLAIN'S PLEA. 

TO C. C. MCCABE, D. D. 

" A million for missions " too much ! did you say? 
It is only a farthing from the wealth of this day ! 
It is only a cup from our great sea of gold, 
Yea! only a mite from our riches untold. 

" A million for missions " too much, can you say I 
When you think of the darkness 'mong those far away, 
As you see the great need of those at your door 
O ! Sure, you say, rather, " I 'd wish to give more." 

The call is a great one, the need is as great, 

The tough must be made smooth, the crooked made straight, 

All high places lowered, and low places high, 

So Christ in his triumph may descend from the sky. 

What part of the million am I able to bear? 
How much of this burden am I willing to share ? 
It may be but little, yet that shall be given, 
Though unnoticed on earth, 'tis recorded in heaven. 

11 A million for missions" this plea shall not die 
On the lips that first uttered it, born from on high, 
We'll fling down our gold, our treasures we'll give, 
Thus the world shall have light and nations shall live. 

" A million for missions" Lord, speed thou the day 
When rough rock and hillock are cleared from the way. 
Then, with knowledge, as sea -waters, earth be o'er rolled, 
And a world shall be glad with the Christ-story told. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



" Wheresoever this gospel shall be 

preached throughout the whole world, this 

i also that she hath done shall be spokek 

H 

I of for a MEMOEIAL of her/' 

;$ Mark, xiv : 9. 



"BE READY TO EVERY GOOD WORK/' 

Titus, Hi : 1 




132 STEAY THOUGHTS. 



WOKLD WIDE MEMOKXALS. 

" The odor of the ointment filled all the house 
where they were sitting." Such, is the striking and 
significant sentence concerning a single act of a once 
careless but now repentant and rejoicing soul. " All 
the house!" yes! the odor of that spikenard has 
touched house, heart, home, and fife, and its fragrance 
shall yet extend wide as the world and far as the 
family of God. That simple, unostentatious act of a 
truly grateful heart, has been far more fragrant than 
would have been an ocean of the u Otter of roses," one 
single drop of which is sufficient to sweeten leagues 
of space. 

The fragrance of that act has increased in quality 
and quantity with the onflow of ages. It has over- 
stepped all the limits of space ! It has overrun all 
boundaries of time. 

A single grain of musk, will fill a chapel with its 
delightful fragrance, so, that many persons may 
breathe its odors, yet, it looses not of weight, or value 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 133 

a single iota, when tested, by the most delicate scales^ 
ever designed or constructed. 

This is marvelous, yet, it is even more marvelous, 
that, the perfume, which rose from the broken box, 
shattered at the feast of Bethany, centuries ago, has 
not only not lost in weight, or value, but, rather, has 
grown in sweetness, strength and quantity, till, touch- 
ing the remotest corners of the earth, and, tendering 
the hearts of all mankind, there has been a literal 
fulfillment of the Master's prophetic words, " Where- 
soever this gospel shall be preached in the whole 
world, there, shall also this, that this woman hath 
done, be told for a memorial of her." 

With the flight of years, unnumbered generations 
of rich, Simon-like pharisees, with little, narrow, 
selfish, and everwithering souls, have been born, 
buried, and forgotten, while this one fragrant act of 
the uninvited, but Christ-loving guest, lives to thrill, 
and inspire to large liberality, nations yet unborn. It 
was but a little act of grateful benevolence, and, of 
itself, must have been soon forgotten, but, for the 
commendatory words of Christ : " She hath done 



134 STRAY THOUGHTS 

what she could." These put a brilliancy upon that 
deed of love, sufficient to make it shine, forever, on 
the tablet of Eternity. As the perfume of the tube- 
rose remains in your room long after the flower 
itself has been removed ; or, as the evening chimes of 
sweet silver-toned bells linger long after they have 
ceased their ringing ; or, as the tinted beams of the 
sinking sun-king fall on western hill-tops even after 
the sun itself has disappeared from sight, so, the 
beneficent acts of a liberal, god-like soul, linger ; live ; 
and lighten the world of men, long after the body 
has gone to rest, yea ; saith the spirit, their works 
do follow them, and, though dead, they yet speak." 
Some, there are, who leave an imperishable name, 
founded on many imperishable acts of charity, the 
smallest of which "A cup of cold water" shall not 
be unrewarded in the coming of the Lord. 

In all of English history, perhaps, no name is 
more familiar, than that of " Sir Phillip Sidney," a 
man, who was by all, conceded to be the gentlest, 
and most accomplished spirit of his times. His 
whole life was beautifully unselfish, and full of kind- 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 135 

liness, and, even, the last act of that splendid soul has 
marked itself as sublime, and put upon the performer's 
name a fragrance so lasting that the world has ever 
since believed, his name was never born to die. Kead 
of the dying man's deed. Here it is : 

Lutzen, a beautiful little city, at the meeting 
point of Eivers Yssel and Berkel, in the Nether- 
lands, was besieged. Sir Phillip was in the conflict 
and there received a mortal wound. He was being 
borne in loving arms off the field of battle when he 
looked up and said to his colleagues, " I am dying ! 
carry me no further, comrades, but, hasten and 
procure me a cup of cold water with which I may 
quench this intolerable thirst, quick ! comrades ! I — 
will — soon — be — gone." 

The water was hurriedly brought, and was being 
lifted to his lips, but, just then, he turned and saw 
a wounded soldier being carried by, who cast a long- 
ing look toward the cup. Sir Phillip kindly, but 
quickly, pushed back the water from his own lips 
saying, " Give it to my comrade, his necessity is 
greater than mine." In a few moments Sir Phillip 



136 STBAY THOUGHTS. 

died, and, later was buried at "Arnheim," but the 
memory of that beautiful life, ending with a cup of 
cold water to a dying comrade, has never been buried, 
though three long centuries have passed away. O ! 
yes, men may be buried, but, the loving deeds, of 
unselfish lives will live on, long as the unburied years 
of God. 

There is a double-series of circles in every one's 
life. One, is the circle of self, which narrows as it 
rises ; the other is the circle of charity, which widens 
as it ascends. The soul that moves only in the former 
circle, is to be pitied, for, consciously or unconsciously 
it is each hour growing more compressed, narrow, 
and little, as it thinks, only, and always, of self, and 
selfish interests. 

The soul moving in the latter circle is to be 
admired and imitated for, it too, consciously or 
unconsciously, in its noble reach after God-likeness, 
and struggle to raise a needy world, rises in majesty 
upward, and ever-upward, rising, growing, expand- 
ing, yea, attaining the fullness of the blessing of the 
gospel of Christ, and at last touching the throne. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 137 

Only such a soul can grasp the richness of the 
Master's words when he said " Give, and it shall be, 
given unto you, good measure pressed down, shaken 
together, and running over shall men give into your 
heart." Yes ; Goldsmith was right when he said : 

"Rich is he whose sympathetic mind 
Exults in all the good of all mankind.'' 

Past experience force all men to know that the 
period of life which is most delightful and refresh- 
ing to memory is that in which we put aside selfish, 
interests and live to bless and benefit others. Surely, 
none of the present age desire to have said of 
them what a biographer says of the selfish Chris- 
tina, the Swedish queen, " None loved her while she 
lived, nor regretted when she died, nor planted on 
her grave a single flower." 

Such a comment at the " coffin of a queen" is a 
striking contrast to the comment of Christ on the 
odor-spreading act of the uninvited guest at the 
Pharisees' feast. " It is more blessed to give than to 
receive," such were the words of the Master, who, 
himself, is ever giving in rich abundance, and floods 



138 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

the universe with a prodigality of gifts, which are^ 
at once, needed ; useful; and overspread with beauty. 

A myriad gifts from God, in the world of nature, 
shine in undimmed splendors all about us. 

Flowers are everywhere in abundance ; from the 
banks of the Khine, to the snow-line of the Alps. 
They bloom in obscure valleys and in the crannies 
of inaccessible rocks. Myriads of them are in out- 
of-the-way places, where no human being ever sees 
their beauty or smells their fragrance. Birds of 
splendid plumage dwell in trackless forests. There 
are cascades, in unvisited gorges, and gems inunfath- 
omed seas. Eiver and ocean, meadow and moun- 
tain, are full of beauty, and, the splendor of the 
heavens, who can describe or paint ? 

The sunlight ! How it abounds. It is not eked 
out in particles just enough to illumine so many eyes 
and no more; it pours upon us; it floods us ; it deluges 
the world ; it flings its splendors across that bound- 
less sea, where stars and systems float. Walk any- 
where, and you tread on the wonderful! Look 
anywhere, and you see the sublime ! Nature is no 



STEAY THOUGHTS. 139 

miser, but, to the eye of this commerical and utilita- 
rian age, she seems rather a waster, for there are 
myriads of flowers which perish unadmired. Only 
a little of all the bird-music is ever heard by mortal 
ears ; for the most part, the avalanche shoots unseen 
into the valley ; and, only a handful of the sun's 
boundless light is ever utilized. The ocean is very 
deep, and the mountain is very high ! Nature abounds 
in liberal gifts and her great, abundant, and never- 
ceasing gifts to man, echo, continually in his ears, 
the words of the Master, "Freely ye have received, 
freely give." 

The river flows down its channel, not in a narrow 
selfishness, but in a broad liberality, giving as it 
goes, alike to mill-race; reservoir; and fish-pond; 
causing the grass to grow ; the flowers to bloom ; and 
trees to live and thrive on its verdure-covered banks. 
Indeed, everything with which it comes in contact 
is beautified, and benefited, cheered and gladdened. 
Nothing can touch its pure and sparkling bosom 
without being refreshed. In its waters birds dip 
their pinions ; fish leap in its trembling flashes of 



140 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

sunshine ; cattle slake their thirst, or lash themselves 
with its cooling drops; yea, too, with its crystal- 
flow, the exhausted fever-patient relieves his parched 
lips, and 

Thus it flows, forever flows, 
Giving always as it goes. 

God, in his final and sublimest work of man- 
creation, has taught us by our very heart- throbbings 
that the continuance of life, yes, the very growth of 
the heart and the body, which is the heart's casket, 
depends upon the double-acting valves of the heart, 
that wonderful reservoir of vitality. The outflow 
past the "tricuspid valves" is as necessary as the 
inflow of liquid life past the " mitral valves." To get 
and get and never give is contrary to all nature. 
See ! The orchards ; they force their leaves, crowd 
their blossoms, fling out and scatter their fragrance, 
yet they have left an abundant harvest of luscious, 
wholesome fruit. The geranium; lilac; and rose, toss 
around us their sweet-scented aromas ! The gardens, 
fields and woods scatter their odors everywhere, and 
all nature gives out a fragrance which rises as a 



STKAY THOUGHTS. 141 

sweet-smelling sacrifice, ever ascending, till it reaches, 
the throne and touches the breath of God. 



SHALL MAN DO LESS THAN BIKDS, BKOOK, 
FIELD, AND FOKEST ! 

An Eastern allegory runs thus: A merchant 
going abroad for a time gave respectively to two of 
his friends, two sacks of wheat, each, to take care of 
till he should return. 

After years had passed, the merchant returned, 
and immediately applied to each of his friends for 
the wheat he had left in their care. The first led 
him aside to his storehouse and granary, and there 
showed him the sacks of wheat. Yes ! they were 
there, but they were mildewed and worthless ! The 
merchant friend said, " I give you all I left with 
you and what you have gained from them shall be 
yours also." The second friend when asked by the 
merchant for that left in his care, led him out into a 
broad, beautiful and open plain, and there pointed 
out to him field after field of waving golden grain, 



142 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

the product of the two sacks left those years in his 
care. 

Said the merchant to his active friend, " Tou have 
been a faithful friend. I give you all I left with 
you, and what you have gained from them shall be 
yours also." 

All this is but a fulfillment of the scripture, " He 
which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; 
but he which soweth bountifully shall reap also 
bountifully." O ! that we may learn, that 

" The heart grows rich in giving" 
All its wealth is living grain : 
Seeds, which mildew in the garner; 
Scattered, fill with gold the plain. 

When Oliver Cromwell visited the old cathedral at 
York, England, he saw, in as many niches, the statues 
of the twelve apostles in solid silver. "What are 
they doing there ? " he asked. When told, he said, 
" Take them down, melt and mint them into coins 
for the treasury, then scatter them over the kingdom 
among the poor, and so let them, like their master, 
go about doing good." 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 143 

The church of Christ, with its vast and ever- 
increasing membership, is rapidly learning that there 
should be but one design in all toil and labor, viz. : 
" That we may have to give to him that needeth," 
and gladly is the thought which is enwrapped in this 
inspired sentence, being written upon every penny 
and purse, bond and bank-book, ledger and safe, 
heart and home, of the Christ-loving, everywhere, 
O ! there is a luxury in doing good ! There is also a 
loss in failing to do good, when an opportunity is 
offered. A loss ? Yes ! and worse, far ; for, 

" He is dead, whose hand is not open wide 
To help the need of a human brother; 
But he doubles the strength of his life-long ride, 

Who gives of his wealth in love to another; 
And a thousand million lives are his 
Who carries the world in his sympathies." 

" O, there are unused millions rolled up and put 
away as hoarded treasure. Soon; yes, very soon 
would the world be privileged to greet the millennial 
morn, if, only some power, human or divine, would 
touch, uncoil, and send out these unused millions as 
ray-streams of light in this benighted sphere. O! 



144 STKAY THOUGHTS. 

for some such power that will break the bands of 
these gold baskets, loose their glittering contents and 
send them sparkling everywhere, and so flood the 
world with help and hope that needy and suffering 
humanity shall rejoice, and thus shall the names of 
the good and righteous be held in everlasting remem 
brance ! 

Christian convert, do not narrow your thought 
and actions on lines of benevolence ! Be broad, gen- 
erous, God-like ; act for the ages to come, as well as 
for the present ! 

Let every deed be prompted by far-reaching, 
benevolent plans, which shall touch the remotest 
corners of the globe, and thrill with gratitude the 
most distant limit of time. 

Look backward ! along the history of the past ! 
Forward ! among the problems of the future ! down- 
ward ! on the generations to come ! and thus antici- 
pate the results of your offerings, in hastening onward 
the final triumph of the Lord. 

The following fable-story is full of suggestive 
thought to every contemplative mind. Years ago a 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 145 

wealthy but selfish man, conceived the idea of put- 
ting his name where it would be remembered forever; 
so write it, and in such a place, that it would never 
be forgotten. 

Away to the forest of ages he went, and, after 
carefully viewing many giant oaks, at last selected 
the one which to his mind seemed most likely to 
endure. Deep in its massive trunk he carved his 
name, and, with much satisfaction gazed upon it and 
said : u There will my name stand forever." But, 
only a little time elapsed when the arm-bared wood- 
man came with shouldered ax, sized the trees of the 
forests and felled, first, the very one upon which the 
name of " Mr. Selfish " had been carved, and as the 
oak fell, his name fell with it, and would soon have 
been forgotten, but for the quick thought which le^ 
him to construct and build, a huge granite monu- 
ment, on whose top-stone he chiseled deep his name." 
" There," said he, u I know it will stand forever," 
but alas ! A storm was brewing ; the heavens grew 
black ; the firmament was livid with the flashes of 
pent-up storm-fires. The war-horses of the storm 



146 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

scud across the sky and shook the rain-drops from 
their shaggy mane ; the crash and boom of rumbling 
thunders came tumbling down from the arches of 
the skies ; and a single stray flash, leaping from out 
the frowning cloud, shattered his pile of granite, and 
hid his carefully carved name in the ruins at the 
base of the shaft his selfish pride had built. 

" What ! shall I be thus defeated in my purpose ! 
No ! no !" he said, and he left with the determination 
of seeking the highest mountain, which he climbed 
wearily to its summit and on the largest boulder of 
the topmost peak he carved again his name, saying, 
" These are the everlasting hills, and here, what is 
written, will abide." Alas ! for him. Only a few 
months passed when lo! the earth trembled, the ocean 
was convulsed, and the mountains reeled and stag- 
gered like drunken men, for an earth-quake, was at 
its play, and the world was rent, and broken, and 
mis-placed, and the name so deep-carved, in rock so 
high, on mount so sure, was forever hidden out of 
sight, in the mountain-rock fragments of the valley. 

In grief and disappointment he turned away 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 147 

toward home and said in reverie as he walked along 
the streets of his native city, disappointed and 
chagrined, " Oaks, granite, and mountain have failed 
me ! There is no place, where my name can be 
written, so as to be known, and remembered for- 
ever." Just then a poor, ragged, and half-starved 
child, of his own town, stepped before him, and 
holding up her pale, thin, hands, she said in plead- 
ing voice : u Please, Sir, give me one penny, to buy 
bread for my dying mother ; she is starving ; Sir ; 
Please ! His usual selfishness was about to rise and 
roughly tell her to " begone ! you beggar " when a 
second, and generous thought lead him to hand her 
a penny. 

What tears of thoughtfulness flowed from her 
eyes, as she looked up into his face, with a smile of 
gratitude, and said, " Please Sir! will you tell me 
your name?" " My name!" said he, in surprise, 
" Why do you wish to know my name ? " " Because 
Sir, my dying mamma said that some day I would 
go to heaven, and, there live, forever! and I want to 
know your name, so that I can tell Jesus how kind 



148 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

you were to me and my starving mamma, and he will 
know you when you come to live there forever." 
Ah 1 the tender chord of the man's soul had been 
struck by the artless and thankful child, and as he 
turned his head aside to brush away the unbidden 
tears, he said to himself, " At last ! at last ! I have 
found out how, and where, to put my name so that 
it will be remembered forever, and, by God's help, 
hereafter I will seek to do all I can for the needy 
around me, and thus carve my name in the immortal 
memories from which it can never fade ! ! " 

There are unnumbered men and women, who, by 
beautiful, yet unostentatious deeds of charity are 
carving their names upon the heart of the world 
carving them so deep that there are not waters 
enough in the sea ; nor fires enough in the sun ; no ! 
nor forces enough in nature, to disturb, disfigure, or 
destroy them ! They are there ; and there written, 
to be remembered, forever ! 

Go! Young follower of Jesus, and break thy 
treasure-box of spikenard, at the feet, head, hand, 
and heart, of the world's hope, and, as thy odorous 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 149 

gifts ascend and fill the world with sweetness, man- 
kind will bless God for the influence which you have 
exerted, and, should no sculptured marble designate 
your burial-spot, your loving deeds will be an eternal 
memorial, the remembrance of which shall be pre- 
served in heaven, and, their record kept on high!! 
How ! shall I break, and where, and why, do you ask ? 
Let God answer ! " Draw out thy soul to the hungry, 
and satisfy the afflicted, then shall thy light shine in 
obscurity and thy darkness be as noonday, and the 
Lord shall guide thee continually and satisfy thy sonl 
in drought, and thou shalt be like a garden in which 
springs of water fail notP 



150 



STRAY THOUGHTS* 




IN MEMORY OF THE CONVERTS AND FRIENDS 
WHO HAVE TRIUMPHANTLY FALLEN " ASLEEP 

IN JESUS/' to WAKE, and ever-live amid 

THE PURE UPPER-WORLD GLORIES. 

R. 8. M. 



STBAY THOUGHTS, 151 



IMMORTAL FRIENDS. 

Deadl 

O! No! Friends are not dead! 

Those friends of by -gone years, 
In Christ they sleep, lift up your head, 

And brush away your tears. 

Dead! 

O! No! lives so sublime ! 

So clear, and strong, so free ! 
Such lives can never end in time 

They live eternally! 

They live! 

Which ever way we turn, 

A thousand thoughts flit past ; 
For, stored in memory's sacred urn 
Is treasured all the past! 

They live! 

Deep -marked on memory's scrolls 

Are many deeds of love, 
Reminding of those noble souls 
Once here ! Now live above ! 

Light! 

Does not die, though sun has set! 

It shines on other worlds ! 
There, tower, spire and minaret 
Gleam like myriad pearls. 



152 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

So these! 

Our friends do ever live! 

E'en as the setting sun, 
Full many a ray to earth doth give, 

Though mankind says " ' Tis gone." 

We do not ! 

See them in the tomb ! 

O'er covered with earth's sod, 
Nor are they wrapped in future gloom, 
They live in light with God! 

Weep not! 

Behold that royal host! 

Redeemed by blood divine, 
Forever dwell they on the coast 

Where God's immortals shine. 

Farewell! 

Blest spirits, rise on high! 

Thou didst but quit thy clay. 
We will not grieve! thou didst not die! 
Soon we shall tread your way. 

Welcome! 

Blest morn! when on the wings! 

Of Christian hope and faith we fly 
With thee! From youth's immortal springs, 

Drink I Who drinks shall never die ! 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



153 




All discouragement is from the devil 



154 STRAY THOUGHTS. 



DISCOURAGEMENTS. 

Discouragements are found in every pathway! 
You have found them in your own! 

Your eyes, are now seeing, for the first time, 
the difficulties, dangers, and anxieties, that have 
touched other souls. Jacob ! was discouraged and 
cried out " all these things are against me." Elijah ! 
was discouraged, and under the shadow of the 
Juniper-tree requested death for himself, saving 
"It is enough, O ! Lord, take away my life. " Jonah ! 
was discouraged and so deeply disappointed that 
he, twice cried out, " It is better for me to die than 
to live. " 

Fretful Jacob ! Fearful Elijah ! Foolish Jonah ! 
For Jacob, God was silently turning the wheels of 
providence in a direction that would eventually and 
inevitably lead the disheartened patriarch to see 
his son Joseph Prime-Minister of all Egypt ! but, he 
could not know, and did not trust, and so became 
discouraged. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 155 

God was preparing for Elijah, a new revelation 
of divine-forces, in which if necessary, all nature 
was to be stirred, shaken, and rent asunder, to show 
him that God was near. Wind ! earth-quake ! fire ! 
voice ! all were to be utilized to scatter the gloom 
from the soul of the prophet, and give him assurance 
that from the foolish oath of a wicked Jezebel, there 
was nothing for him to fear. God led him to see 
his folty in giving away to distrust and discourage- 
ments, and once more, Elijah becomes himself, 
rises from the gloom, wraps himself around with 
his mantle, and, goes forth to talk with God. 

It was God's design to teach Jonah a great and 
lasting lesson of mercy, but, it was all in vain 1 
Unlike the patriarch or prophet, he would not look, 
listen, or learn, himself, nor was he willing that 
the Ninevites should live. 

Sea ! sun ! gourd ! and grace ! could not break 
the spell of chagrin and gloom that had settled upon 
his soul, and, so far as we know, he died disappointed 
and discouraged, saying "I do well to be angry, 
even unto death." Foolish man ! To die, thus, in the 



156 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

presence of a God, so good, gracious, and power- 
ful. 

If a man mill rise above discouragements, then, 
by the help of God, he may! If he won't, then, all 
outside forces are impotent, and, of necessity, he is 
left to go the way of his own choosing and, in all 
the future, move through dreary and ever-darkening 
days, days that will be as nights, and nights, that 
will be as years. Seasons of trial may come, but 
be not dismayed by them, for, to the trusting soul, 
they sometimes become the best educators, and, such 
a soul, can sometimes, see farther through a tear, 
than a telescope. Already, perhaps, you have been 
looking at the encamped hosts of the enemy around 
you instead of looking up and beholding the mountains 
full of the chariots of the Lord. 

Possibly you have taken time to measure the 
strength of the enemy, but, have forgotten to 
measure the length of the arm of God which upholds 
you. Or, so long have you gazed at the walls of 
Jerico, and so little at the throbbing-forces of 
Omnipotence, that your difficulties appear insur- 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 157 

mountable, and in soul grief, feeling that you are 
about to be vanquished, you have raised the 
Israelitish cry of despair." " All the land is full of 
giants, and, the cities are walled up to heaven." 

[Not so! discouraged one! your difficulties are not 
more numerous, than others have been, your dangers 
not more dreadful, nor are the waters through which 
you are now-passing, deeper ! Tour mistake has been, 
as that of the Dothan-youth, who, looking, only, at 
the Syrian-hosts encircling him, and, comparing his 
strength with theirs, cried out " Alas ! Master we 
perish, 5 ' when Elisha-like, he should have counted 
God in and sang with heaven-born confidence " They 
that be with us, are more than thev that be with 
them." 

Instead of looking through eyes of trust, to him, 
who commands the armies of the upper-worlds, you 
have gazed long, and, with ever-increasing alarm; 
through the goggles of grief and gloom under whose 
double-magnifying force, molehills have appeared 
as mountains; pebbles as boulder-rocks; and, 
dwarfs whose height, a child could measure with 



158 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

a two-foot rule, have risen to warrior-giants, whose 
helmets seemed to touch the stars. 

The gathering clouds ! what are they ! They are 
not the massing of inimical forces, collecting to 
crowd down upon and destroy you. No I No ! By 
faith in God you may see them, gilded in splendor 
by the glorifying-rays of the sun's touch, start 
upward and heavenward, suddenly changed into 
hurrying chariots-of-gold, upon which, one would be 
glad to step, and, roll up to the crystal sea of heaven. 
The outflashing lights of these clouds, what are they ! 
They are not the drawn swords of angry gods, 
ready to thrust you through ! they are not leaping- 
tongues of living flame dashing around to destroy 
you ! No ! by faith, you may look up and see them 
as prancing steeds champing their golden-bits, and 
pawing the cloud-valleys at their feet, in their eager- 
ness to ascend and bear you away into the presence 
immortal. Tes ! More, you may follow them up 
into the splendid city of God, even as Elijah did his 
cloud-chariot and chargers of fire, which lifted him 
up and away from the banks of Jordan, leaving the 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 159 

astonished servant to gather up the sacred mantle 
of his ascending master, which in folds of splendor 
fell at his feet. 

Every great and successful character of the past 
has had difficulties similar to or greater than your 
own. Obstacles, thick as a dragon's teeth have risen 
in their pathway. These they considered, but, only 
considered long enough to measure their real strength 
which, when they had done, they fearlessly advanced 
to crush them. They counted upon difficulties, they 
counted also upon success I and under the inspiration 
of possible future victories they went forth "fair 
as the moon, clear as the sun and terrible as an army 
with banners." 

They never allowed themselves to become dis- 
couraged by the magnitude of duties which rose 
before them, nor, by the incompleteness of those 
already done. "With a burning desire for the right, 
and an implicit confidence in the upper-world 
forces, which constantly uplifted and bore them 
onward, they moved forward and upward to 
lasting success, and by their unselfish and daring 



160 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

movements, cut deep their names on historic tab- 
lets, where they will remain forever, and be ac- 
knowledged as men whose thought and hope were 
fixed on objects far above the discouraging dangers 
at their feet. 

Indeed ! every human life is beset and besieged by 
trials, vexations and hinderances, which may wreck 
the weakling, but which, to every true man, only 
serves to develop new resources and wake up latent 
powers, for future and more terrific conflicts. Men 
of force and usefulness have often found sorrows to 
be their best educators, and have, we repeat, fre- 
quently seen farther through a tear than a telescope. 
The deeds of gallant bravery by Caesar and Charle- 
magne, by Cromwell and Napoleon, stirred the world 
at the time of their performance and marked new 
eras on history's page. 

They were men of invincible courage ! Nothing 
could daunt their spirit, or, long obstruct their way 
Were they met with superior numbers ? Then, they 
applied superior skill. Were they defeated in battle ? 
Then, they rose in new-born strength, and, turned 
defeat into victory. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 161 

Here is an instance : 

At one time the Marshals of Napoleon came to 
their commander, and, in great alarm, said : " We 
have lost the battle and are being cut to pieces !" 

The great General glanced at his watch and said 
in reply : 

"It is only two o'clock in the afternoon— you 
have lost a battle, but we have time to win another. 
Charge ! Charge ! upon the foe ! ! " While adver- 
sity is always a bitter draught, yet, it is very fre- 
quently the stern nurse of wisdom, in whose arms 
have been tended and taught, some of the strongest 
and most influential characters history has ever 
known, many of whom looking back over their line 
of life would be compelled to say, 

The hours of pain have yielded good 

Which prosperous days refused, 
As herbs, though scentless when entire, 

Spread fragrance when they're bruised. 

Shall we, as Christians, have less courage in life's 
battles than men of the world ? JSfo ! rather we may 
make the difficulties which might discourage others, 



162 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

the means of bringing out all the heroic qualities of 
a nobJe Christian soul. 

By these very adversities, we should learn self- 
denial and endurance, and cultivate, in these seasons 
of discouragements, a noble, Christ-like indifference, 
such as is indispensable to highest manhood, for, the 
moral fibers, thus developed, is a requisite of a use- 
ful, prosperous, Christian life. 

The Psalmist must first be able to say " We went 
through fire and water " before he could triumph- 
antly sing " but the Lord hath brought us out into a 
wealthy place. 55 Not only the Psalms, but, indeed 
many poems of the past deal largely with the 
troubled lives of the great and the good, and, their 
very strain of sadness is often the poem's greatest 
charm. 

We are all living under the law of contrasts, of 
lights and shadows, and, however irritating it may 
be to the ardent spirit of youth, we must yet learn, 
even if slowly, that, the causes of discouragement, 
may, under God, be turned into head-streams of 
victory, and, may often become, the means whereby, 
we are led to the grandest triumphs. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 163 

He, who would sing divinest songs, and, fill the 
world with sweetest melodies, must go down into 
deepest water-floods, pass through hottest fires, and, 
spend blood-sweating hours in Gethsemane! 

Truth was never more beautifully and clearly 
expressed than in the adjoining poetic thought, which 
says: 

As the grape must be crushed before 
Can be gathered the glorious wine; 
So the poet's heart must be wrung to the core 
Ere his song can be divine. 

The Christian soul which would be best prepared 
to solve life's problems, and, satisfactorily perform 
life's duties, may expect " Contrary winds," even 
" Euroclydon " to strike his pathway. Indeed ! until 
Gennesaret's billows beat against our soul's craft, and 
each wave rise up as if to engulf us, and the despair- 
ing " Master, Master, carest thou not that we perish," 
touch our lips, we can not perceive the royal majesty 
that sits upon the brow of Christ, nor, realize what 
omnipotent forces are wrapped up in the words of 
him who is " in the hinder-part of the ship asleep on 
a pillow." 



164 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

Says, Addison, " The gods, in bounty, work up 
storms about us that give mankind occasion to exert 
their hidden strength, and throw out into practice, 
virtues that shun the day, and lie concealed in the 
smooth seasons and calms of life." 

As many gems glisten and flash in the darkness 
more than in the light, so, there are pearls of divine 
brilliancy at all other times invisible, and which are 
discovered by us only in hours of temptation's 
darkness. 

When life seems almost undermined by disap-, 
pointment and misfortune, then, it is, that, by a 
noble, god-like effort, we may with heroic and 
precious deeds, overlay the petty annoyances of life 
and by this method, either hide them altogether, or 
change their loathsomeness into positive beauty. 

After all, it is the rough work that forms and 
polishes gems, from their crude, natural state into 
objects of blazing beauty. Pebbles; rough, ill. 
shaped, and angular, and by no means beautiful, 
may be found anywhere inland away from the 
storms, but, if you would find the beautifully rounded 



STEAY THOUGHTS. 165 

and polished pebbles, you must go to that rock- 
lined shore where long white lines of breakers come 
rolling in from the agitated deep, and toss and rattle, 
round and polish, the pebbles of the storm-beaten 
strand. 

That landscape is not most beautiful, that has in 
it only gaudy, flashing, colors, nor, do artists, and 
trained eyes generally, value a picture by the number 
of its brilliant tintings, for, they know, that, to make 
a really beautiful picture there is required the black 
cloud! as well as the bright sunshine! the cold 
mountain-peak in the distance, as well as the pure 
crystal spring at their feet ; the rocky shore, as well 
as the wide sweeping plain; the apparently useless 
under-growth, as well as the massive, towering oak. 

As it is in nature ; so, it is in art ! as in art; so, 
in grace ! For perfection, there is required the beat- 
ing storm- wave of the sea ; the black-lined cloud 
of the sky, and the sharp-edged knife of the dia- 
mond cutter. Contrasted beauty is always attrac- 
tive ! In what sometimes seems to us, hard-dealing, 
there, God has no end in view but to beautify, polish, 



166 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

and perfect His people, to make of them gems, a 
royal-setting for His eternal crown. 

If we will, we may learn a lesson of trust from 
what the poets call, " The Nebel meer or golden sea- 
cloud of Swiss-Land ! " It is a dense mass of clouds 
stretching away to the farthest verge of the hori- 
zon, even as one continuous sea. Viewed from the 
earth's level, it.is seen only as banks of piled up dark- 
ness, but, witnessed from the summit of Mt. Faul- 
horn, which, rises above the clouds, and looking 
down from these heights, behold ! it is dazzling in its 
brightness and radiant with the splendors of East- 
ern sun. From earth's side, gloom ! from heaven's 
side, Golden ! 

It is but a repetition, in form, of the god-sent 
pillar of cloud and fire, which though one and the 
selfsame thing, was, to the Egyptians, on one side, 
darkness, and, to Israel, on the other side, light. So 
in the dark, disagreeable, discouraging, events of 
life, the worldling, may see naught but a frowning 
Providence while the King's sons "behold a father's 
smiling face. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 167 

O ! to learn the art in life's distressing hours, of 

trusting much, and trembling little, saying in such 

seasons : 

Courage my soul, thy God is wise, 
Be like him ; Be not sad ! 
But Phoenix-like from fires rise 
In new strength, yea ! beauty clad ! 

O ! Be not discouraged, though thy lot may 
seem hard, for the very things, which drag thy 
spirit down, may be disguised blessings. They may 
be but the thin outer and bitter rind, of the inner, 
luscious and wholesome fruit, which, as yet, may be 
hidden away by this nauseous covering. 

Just as an experienced hand at the loom, throws 
in rags of all colors, lengths, and kinds, but, event- 
ually from all this tangled, and vari-colored rag-mass, 
weaves a beautiful and useful pattern, so, God, may 
be weaving, the disagreeable, many-shaded, and, 
seemingly tangled experiences of your life, into a 
beautiful, well-formed plot, upon which, eventually, 
you will look with satisfaction and delight. 

Jacob, was never more disheartened, and broken- 
spirited, than, when alone in the desert-land, away 



168 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

from home and friends, weary and tired, in body and 
mind he lay him down to rest. The earth, was his 
bed ! the sky, his coverlet ! and, for a pillow, he used 
a stone ! Surely, here were sufficient causes for dis- 
couragement ! Tet, in this hour of combined, dis- 
tressing circumstances he had the most thrilling, and 
sublime, experience of his life, for, here, he was 
wrapped in the visions of the infinite, and here, he 
witnessed, what none other had ever witnessed, 
" Angels descending, and ascending, on a heaven- 
dropt ladder, with foot, resting on the earth, and 
top, touching the throne of heaven. 

All nature is full of electricity, and yet, sparks 
of electric splendor are seldom seen, save, when 
there is severe and constant friction ! so ; the visions 
of God are many and splendid, yet, are they seldom 
seen save by those eyes and hearts which are rubbed 
hard by the emery-stone of affliction. 

The truth is that every man who has visibly been 
influenced for good, the times, in which he lived, has 
had his discouraging; tragical; trying hours; and 
you, young disciple, need not be taken unawares 
should such hours come to you. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 169 

They will come! for, your life, without them, 
would be incomplete, as compared with the life of 
Jesus who was " made perfect through suffering." 
God is with thee in all these things ! He knows thy 
heart ! and as the master-musician knows in which 
notes the sweetest melodies exist, and touches when, 
and where, he pleases to reach the desired chord, so r 
God ! knows well which keys to strike in the human 
soul in order to bring out the most perfect harmo- 
nies. 

O ! that we all may learn to say in the sweet 
submission of another ; 

Strike! Thou the Master! we thy keys 
The anthem of thy destinies. 
The minor of thy loftier strain 
Our heart shall breathe the old refrain 
"Thy will be done." 

Chautauqua !* That increasingly-famous and de- 
servingly-loved " Hall in the grove " has a trio of 
inspiring mottoes beautifully engraved upon each 
diploma. 

So encouraging is each of the mottoes that it 
requires wise discrimination to choose between them, 

*The author is a C, L. S. C. graduate " Progressive class 1886." 



170 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

yet, if the task were ours we should select that one^ 
where two visible human hands are firmly clasped, 
covered with a third invisible hand (the hand of 
God), and where two voices blend in sweet harmony 
as they say each to the other what I now desire to 
say to you, dear convert, 

"Never be Discouraged" for, though; 

In the furnace God may prove thee, 
Thence he '11 bring thee forth more bright ; 

He will never cease to love thee, 
Thou art precious in his sight ; 

God IS with thee! 
God thine Everlasting Light. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



"We measure Jesus by the light He 

I HAS SHED UPOtf THE WORLD." 

Rev. J. H. Brookes, D.D. 



172 STRAY THOUGHTS. 



CHRIST AND CHRISTMAS. 

'Tis Christmas day ! Hail, happy morn, 

Our thoughts speed far away 
Where Christ the world's sole hope was born 

As seraphs sang their lay. 

Why? happy morn ! why term it thus I 

Or celebrate his birth ! 
Hath aught of good been added us 

In Christ's advent to earth? 

Good ! O, yes ! All good we say 

He, to the world, is this; 
The Life ! the Truth ! the perfect Way ! 

That leads to lasting bliss. 

He is, in all men's lives and times, 

The hope, for world's to come ; 
He binds mankind in moral lines , 

Gives each, that seeks, a home I 

A myriad million happy hearts 

With joy, leap high, to-day ! 
And the tear of welcome, eyeward starts 

As the children homeward stray. 

Our Christ ! and Christmas ! Joyous words 1 

Which, every heart doth thrill, 
Beside which cord, sweet nightingale's 
Is but discordant trill. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 173 

Hail ! happy morn \ thrice- welcome thou ! 

In this, thine oft return ; 
Neglect of thee; or Christ; from now 

We'll ever, quickly spurn. 



174 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 




STRAY THOUGHTS. 175 



BEADING AND READEES. 

Every generation has had its great, thoughtful, 
and profoundly intellectual men ! 

Like all other men, these in their turn, have gone 
away, but unlike other men, they have left volumes 
of imperishable thoughts, which live and will con- 
tinue to live, an inspiration, to every ambitious soul 
following in their track. 

These giant intellects have scattered all along 
their pathway, thought-jewels, that flash out light 
and help which, even, the lowliest of earth may 
secure as their own. 

Every convert should be a reader, and,as a Christ- 
ian, feel a moral responsibility for what he reads, 
for, consciously, or unconsciously, our reading 
becomes a part of our thought, and " as a man think- 
eth, so is he," hence, in a measure at least, the char- 
acter of a man is as the character of his reading. 

That, " we become like those with whom we 



176 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

associate," is as applicable to our reading, as to our 
conversation, or companions, therefore, let us read 
only, and always, the best thoughts, of purest writers. 
Such are easy of access, and, so abundant that they 
fall around us thick as the autumnal leaves of a wind- 
shaken tree, and numerous as the winter snow-flakes 
fluttering in the air. 

However poor you may be, or humble your 
dwelling, you may, for the fewest pence have for 
your companions the tallest intellects of the past ! 
Through books, Milton will come back and restanza 
his u Paradise Lost ! " Through the same medium, 
life will be dramatically portrayed by " Shakespeare! " 
and " Franklin ! " will regive, by the score, those 
practical, terse, and everyday-useful facts couched 
in his habitual short sentence, which, went as straight 
to the heart of human-kind as the arrow of the 
never-failing-marksman, sped toward, and, struck 
the target's centre. 

We are living in an age of wonders ! An age, 
in which, we speed across continents with almost 
alarming rapidity, tracking hard upon the heels of 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 177 

the iron horse, which goes leaping over every hill- 
top, and, bounding down into every valley, or, with 
a piercing search of apparent delight, flies, as if on 
wings, over the trestled ravines, from mountain to 
mountain-top. 

A single telephonic wire stretched to its utmost 
tension bears on its unseen wings, our voice, to friends 
afar, and, whether, we laugh or weep ; sing or sigh; it 
is ever ready to carry our message, and, in its flight, 
reveal not a word, save to the ear we send it. Elec- 
trics ! flash out from their suspended towers, and, 
instantaneously, turn darkness into day, and by their 
beauty, brilliancy, and numbers, almost lead the 
uninitiated to think that a million new-moons are 
shining on the city. 

In our day mountains are tunneled ! bridges sus- 
pended ! and, cars are cabled ! Truly, this is a sub- 
lime age, of sublimer wonders! A myriad marvels 
come trooping up in such rapid succession that they 
tread, each upon the heels of the other, and, if we 
keep abreast of our age, and keep stop to the music 
of the times in which we iive r we must read, and, 



178 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

read much from the heaven-guided pens of the ster- 
ling christian men and women rising up on every 
side. 

All along the Nile banks of Egypt are found frag- 
ments of mammoth statuary, and, remains of vast 
structures, which, are but the wrecks and remnants 
of former splendor, which once towered high on 
Afric-plains, or, lifted their strong forms from the 
" delta of the Nile ! " but, they fell at last in ruins, 
for, the Nitre-of-the-Nile, a corroding, disintegrating 
element of the waters had been for ages ; centuries ; 
and decades; silently, eating away their base, and, 
when, the subsidence came, there was a crash of 
alarm, and, the former pathway of splendor was now 
a track of ruins ! 

A lack of intelligence, resulting from a failure to 
read, has been the ruin of what would otherwise 
have been a noble and useful soul, and, if neglect on 
this line is continued it may yet sap the foundations 
of individual, Church, and State! Every young 
Christian should keep himself informed on all impor- 
tant topics. 



STKAY THOUGHTS. 179 

In your search after information steer clear of all 
the loose-jointed; light-weighted; faith-questioning; 
writers of your day. Such, are they, who have sent 
upon the world a flood of false ideas and by an 
assumed brilliancy, have supplanted the nobler 
thoughts of former and better years. Avoid them ! 
look not upon them! turn from them! and, pass 
aw ay ! for, ultimately they hack the soul, and, though 
in time, the hack-wound may overheal, yet, the scar 
is always there ! 

You can never entirely get away from the influ- 
ence and effects of a wrong-spirited and unwhole- 
some paper; book; or magazine I Like the under- 
garment of ancient "Nessus," it will not away, it 
remains forever, a clinging curse. 

Do you ask "What shall we read?" To this 
query no specific reply can be given. Each person 
must choose according to his surroundings; his 
capacity to grasp ideas ; and, his ability to secure his 
choice. 

In our day a thousand book-jewels flash on every 
hand, and, amid their brilliancy, beauty, and worth 



180 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

one is confused, and, with difficulty decides which ta 
select,. There are writers, historic ! Writers, syn- 
thetic ! Writers, analytic ! Writers, ancient ! Wri- 
ters, modern ! Writers, prose ! Writers, poetic ! and 
these all, flash like meteors ; shine like comets ; and 
burn like blazing suns ! In the modern book-world, 
it is no exaggeration to say, these valuable helpers, 
are myriads ! Indeed ! the prodigality of rich, racy, 
readable material, is the marvel of our day. 

Let us not pick weeds, when we may have lilies, 
nor pluck a thorn, when a rose is as near ; or inhale a 
stench when we may breathe aromas which rise 
from flowers that grow in the gardens of God. No ! 
Let us cull only the choicest from earth's literary 
conservatories, and, in all our reading, study, and 
thought, keep close to our heart, the Holy Book of 
God, the precious, precious Bible. 

Whatever else you read or fail to read neglect 
not this guide of the youthful ; the strength of the 
strong man; and the staff of the aged pilgrim! 
Here, the most vital truths are wrapped up in the 
shortest sentences ! Here, the grandest doctrines 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 181 

with which man has ever had to deal, are couched in 
briefest phrase. Here, are pages radiant with spirit- 
ual light, and letters that quiver with living power. 

Other books may have sparks of divine fire, this ! 
blazes majestic like the sun ! Others, like a dim 
and distant star, may cast a little light on the world, 
this ! floods the world like Ossian ! Others, may be 
a crevice through which the light tries to force its 
way. This is a wide-open door through which it 
rolls in splendor! Yes! this is the Candle of the 
Lord! The Star of Eternity ! The lamp from off 
God's everlasting throne ! 

The piled-up wisdom of the ages is enfolded in its 
utterances and, he ! who would be wise ; must here 
learn I he ! who would be strong ; must here feast ! he t 
who would be refreshed must here drink. 

In the pages of that volume, and in their true 
substance, of which they are but the shadow, is the 
elixir which confers immortal youth upon him who is 
brave enough, and pure enough, to kiss and quaff the 
golden draught. 

Intellectual and spiritual gold-dust, which may 



182 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

be had for the mere stooping and gathering, is scat- 
tered all over its surface, and, all through its pages 
are truths, that, glisten even, for the careless ones, 
but there are treasure-mines hidden away from care- 
less eyes, and, never revealed, save to those who seek 
for them as for silver, and search for them as for 
hidden gold. 

Indeed ! Of the Bible we may say much more 
than the Abbie Winkleman said of that matchless 
statue, " The Apollo of the Vatican." 

Go, and study it, and, if you see no peculiar 
beauty in it to captivate you, go again ; and should 
you still discern nothing, go again j and again ; and 
AGAIN ; for, be assured it is there ! ! 

The same starry heavens are pictured upon the 
eye of the superstitious savage as upon that of the 
scientific astronomer, but, O ! how much more one 
sees in them than the other. An untaught child, 
and a skillful engineer gaze upon the same beautiful 
steamer, riding majestically over crest, billow, and 
wave, but one sees vastly more than the other, of the 
power, laws, and uses of each separate part, and of 
their relations as parts to the whole. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 183 

Look up into the firmament ! It is full of night- 
gems, of which, one careless glance will reveal many ! 
Look long, and steadily, and lo ! You see many 
more ! Call, now, to your aid a telescope, which 
leads back ; hack ; back ; into the myriad fields of 
more than myriad light-gems, and each look will be 
rewarded with star-beauties, the numbers increasing 
proportionately with the time, extent, and depth of 
the search. 

If this be true of stars in the firmament, much 
more is it true of the sparkling gems of thought, 
which glisten ; flash ; and smile ; in every verse of the 
Bible. It is full of springs, which, if but touched 
will unlock hidden truths of sterling worth, yet, 
they are springs which respond and act, only, when 
touched by anxious ; penetrating ; godly minds ; and, 
much as such minds derive from it, not even these 
can take its full measure, for it compasses heaven 
and earth ; time and eternity ; and undertakes the 
more than Herculean task of teaching man his duty ; 
destiny ; and the character of his God ! All over 
its pages should be written in letters of light the 



184 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

word, " Infinite," and, on our lips should ever dwell 
the Psalmist's prayer, " Open Thou mine eyes, that 
I may behold wondrous things out of Thy Law." 

Wondrous things are there! God has put in 
those pages more beauty than man can ever see! 
Yet ! If we look long enough, and our hearts are 
pure enough, and our study sufficiently intense, we 
shall be rewarded with thoughts divine and lessons 
more than human. It is the unfailing fount of Wis- 
dom ! ! Whittier, in his beautiful poem, " The 
Yaudois Teacher," puts words upon the lips of the 
" old peddler," which give his own thought of their 
value, as he calls the Bible " The Gem of purest lus- 
tre," the pearl of greatest price ! " These are Whit- 
tier's words : 

O! lady fair, these silks of mine are beautiful and rare, 

The richest web of the Indian loom, which beauty's queen might 

wear; 
And my pearls are pure as thy own fair neck with whose radiant 

light they vie; 
I have brought them with me a weary way — Will my gentle lady 

buy? 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 185 

And the lady smiled on the worn old man through the dark and 
cltistering curls, 

Which veiled her brow as she bent to view his silks and glitter- 
ing pearls; 

And she placed their price in the old man's hand and lightly 
turned away, 

But she paused at the wanderer's earnest call — " My gentle lady, 
stay!" 

" O lady fair! I have yet a gem which a purer lustre flings, 
Than the diamond flash of the jewelled crown on the lofty brow 

of kings — 
A wonderful pearl of exceeding price, whose virtue shall not 

decay; 
Whose light shall be as a spell to thee and a blessing on thy way ! " 

The lady glanced at the mirroring steel where her form of grace 
was seen, 

Where her eye shone clear and her dark locks waved, their clasp- 
ing pearls between ; 

" Bring forth thy pearl of exceeding worth, thou traveler gray and 
old— 

And name the price of thy precious gem, and my page shall count 
thy gold." 

The cloud went off from the pilgrim's brow, as a small and 

meager book, 
Unchased with gold or gem of cost from his folding robe he took 
"Here, lady fair, is the pearl of price, may it prove as such to 

thee! 
Hay— keep thy gold— I ask it not, for the Word of God is free / " 



]86 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

The hoary traveler went his way but the gift he left behind 
Has had its pure and perfect work on that high- born maiden's 

mind, 
And she hath turned from the pride of sin to the lowliness of 

truth, 
And given her human heart to God in its beautiful hour of youth t 

And she hath left the gray old halls where an evil faith had 

power, 
The courtly knights of her father's train and the maidens of her 

bower; 
And she hath gone to the Vaudois vales by lordly feet untrod 
Where the poor and needy of earth are rich in the perfect sight 

of God! 

Yes ! Here ! in the book of God is the highest 
set of truths, ever given to the world ; Truths ! in 
which the story of human life is drawn out to its 
fullest lengths, forcing the conviction upon the mind 
of every candid reader, that, life, touching as it 
does, all the past, present, and future, is loaded with 
responsibilities which weighten as we near the Judg- 
ment Day. Again, I say, young convert Read 
Your Bible ! 

This counsel-giving chapter on reading would cer- 
tainly be incomplete, did I not urge you as a young 
Christian to be also a careful and constant reader 



STEAY THOUGHTS. 187 

of the literature published by the denomination of 
which you are a member. If you would know its 
doctrines, usages, and enterprises, you must read its 
books, papers, magazines, and pamphlets, for here, 
and here only, is its progress at home and abroad, its 
ministry and membership, its victories and defeats, 
all discussed at length and in fairness. Here ! are 
spread out as a panorama, all the great enterprises 
of the particular church, to which you are solemnly 
pledged, before God, and the great congregation. 
Here ! are printed ideas which go flying through the 
world, and in their flight mould, in some measure, 
every public thought. Here! is wisdom flashing 
from the pens of godly men whose published 
thoughts are an inspiration to every truly zealous 
servant of Christ. Eead the religious, denomina- 
tional publications of the church of which you are 
a part. 

Generally, the chief of a Christian editorial staff 
is the strong man among his fellows, one, in whose 
hands truth blazes like a torch, and falls like sparks 
upon powder ; one, who thinks for himself, and, for 



1S8 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

the age in which he lives, measurably guides its 
thought, and, thus inspires it to act on solid princi- 
ples. 

Because he has been regarded as a chief among 
his equals, therefore, he has been taken from the pul- 
pit or platform, presidency or professorship where 
he has long addressed hundreds, and put in a posi- 
tion, where, through the columns of book, magazine, 
pamphlet, and paper, he may now speak to tens of 
thousands. 

They are usually men of remarkable firmness of 
character ; deep thought ; and full of heaven-inspired 
boldness, which leads them to attack the wrong, and 
defend the right, whether of friend or foe, in church 
or out. 

For a week ; month ; or quarter ; according to 
their publication, they watch the movements of a 
world, and after a careful survey of world-facts, 
viewed from the higher summits of a Christian expe- 
rience, they write their richest editorial comments. 

Eeligious periodicals are not the dull, prosy, 
insipid, fireiess stuff, that some persons who never 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 189 

read them suppose they are. They are full of inter- 
est! influence! and information! In all their col- 
umns there are seen sparks of holy fire, leaping in 
every direction, from the anvil of the editor, whose 
brawny arm, strong brain, and Christian heart, has 
been carefully penning these fire-lines of light ; help ; 
and blessing ! 

What papers do you take is a question crowded 
to the front by many a faithful pastor, and, if all 
the answers, given to such a query, could be pub- 
lished and preserved, they would form a curious and 
sometimes very inconsistent medley for Christian 
homes. 

Papers ! Books ! Magazines ! Tracts ! O ! how 
abundant! So numerous have they become that 
they fall thick as snow-flakes at our door, fall in 
great abundance, yet of the pure type there is not 
one too many, nor do they come too often, though 
they come at all times. How many there are ! 
Dailies! Weeklies! Monthlies! And Quarterlies! 
And at all prices ! From the one-penny daily of the 
great city, to the most beautiful, costly, illustrative, 



190 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

and attractive monthly. There are papers for all 
persons, all policies, and all professions. Papers 
which discuss all phases, and, look at all sides, of 
the legal, medical, educational, scientific and com- 
mercial world ! It is by this means the world keeps 
familiar with its own affairs, and, by this same 
means Christians may, and, should, be familiar with 
the triumphs, doctrines, and methods of the Church. 

Indeed ! Every Christian home should be sup- 
plied with a good, live, spiritual, church paper. I 
say, church papers, because while the county, state, 
and national literature which reaches our homes, 
may be full of needed information, yet, there can 
be but very little space devoted to church interests 
or the publication of facts which show the onward 
march of Messiah's Kingdom. 

More than this ; while there are many editors of 
secular papers who have a desire to comment on the 
rapid roll of Christ's chariot, they dare not speak out 
their sublimest thoughts; nor utter their deepest 
convictions, for, well do they know that all their 
readers are not Christians, and, such, they think, must 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 191 

not be offended, and, so thinking, they regretfully 
smother in birth, the noblest, divinest, thoughts ever 
conceived in their minds. Not so with the Christian 
men who sit in the editorial chairs of church publica- 
tions. Their deepest conviction, their sublimest, 
thought, their fullest expression may be written, and 
will be accepted by the Christian millions into whose 
hands and homes they fall. They, and they only, 
dare to draw real life-like sketches which set the 
blood on fire with noble purpose and lead others to 
reach up after the Being who has given to the writers 
themselves, nobility ; breadth ; power ; and inspira- 
tion ! 

As we read the columns written by these men of 
God and partake of the richness and sweets which 
continually drip from their pen and press, we are led 
to think "Bees have been alighting on their lips " 
even as it is reported they did on the lips of the 
Athenian Plato. These godly writers incessantly 
feed us with the " finest of wheat and honey out of 
the rock," by heralding thoughts original, and strik- 
ing, or throwing out rousing truths that are new to 



192 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

their generation ; truths ! whose value, the receding 
ages, shall in no way impair. This combined influ- 
ence of pen and press in the hands of Christian men 
and women is the most marvelous moral machinery 
ever set in motion ! Thoughts are no longer 
restricted to an oral address, or, a single assembly, 
but as if by magic, they transfer their one thought 
to a million minds, every hour teaching all homes, 
and, thus they give hope to the weary, help to the 
discouraged, and at the same time rouse the wicked 
with their thunder-notes of alarm. 

The printing-press is a silent means, but, it is 
rapid as the winds that sweep over continents, and 
its management we place in the hands and on the 
hearts of our mightiest men ; men, whom we have 
reason to believe will rightly educate the on-coming 
generations of the church, and, mould, in large 
measure, the public sentiment of millions who are, 
as yet, unreached by the living voice of pulpit or 
platform. Eead then, the best, and the best only, 
and avoid as you would the scorpion, the flood of 
highly-seasoned, cheap, and chaffy literature, which has 



STKAY THOUGHTS. 193 

come rolling down, upon this modem age, with more 
than torrent-force ! 

Do you ask " How shall we read ? '' There are 
two ways " dipping and diving" which might be, not 
inaptly, compared with the water motions of " sea- 
gull and ocean-diver." The former, floats gaily 
above the surface of the sea, and occasionally drops 
down and wing-tips the waters of the wave, then 
quickly circles up and away. The latter, is fully 
prepared, and, plunging into the vast ocean depths, 
brings up vast treasures that were long hidden there. 
The passing emigrant stoops to pick up a single gold- 
flake, by chance found glistening there, while, the 
resident-miner tears away the soil, picks the clay, 
and breaks the rock to atoms, till he touch the track 
of treasure and reach the vein of gold. 

Time is occupied by the gold digger in throwing 
aside the obstructing surface material ; so too, the 
gold-refiner uses time to skim off the surface or alloy, 
which is but valueless refuse, but that time is used, 
and, the dross handled by him, only that he may 
the more clearly see the gold, and, handle the 
unalloyed, the precious metal ; so, all reading should 



194 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

be carefully guarded, indulging in the lighter litera- 
ture only when it is absolutely necessary to secure 
the richer treasure farther down. In all the world's 
history there has not been known a period, nor seen 
a time, in which such great possibilities were offered 
to the young as now. 

The present and future are ablaze with radiant 
prospects! Ten-thousand hands, way-marks, and 
sign-boards, point out the paths which, lead to a suc- 
cessful realization, a happy termination of all these 
prospects. They are not the mists of the worldling's 
horizon, which, ever recedes as you advance, but they 
are the fixed, great, granite promises of God, which, 
only await your arrival to make all their blessings 
thine ! 

Move on ! Young convert, taking as helpers in 
your christian journey, the beautiful advices from 
the pens and prints of godly men and women. 
Associate with, meditate upon, and partake of, their 
counsels, and, you will find that you have been 
in-drinking what Goldsmith beautifully describes as : 
" Powers that raise the soul to flame " 
Catch every nerve and vibrate through the frame." 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



195 




The Sun shall no more go down, neither 
shall the moon with-draw itself, for, the 
Lord shall be thine everlasting light, and \ 
thy God thy glory. 



196 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

AMERICA'S GOLDEN SUN-SET. 
Afar o'er the western hill-tops, 

O'er woodland, and water, and meer, 
Flashed the bright-tinted beams of the Sun-King 

Flinging gladness a'far and a'near. 

'Twas the time of the lowing of cattle, 
Yea; the time of the birds' evening trill, 

When was heard the mad roar of the waters 
That had ceased now to grind at the mill. 

Every tree-top seemed naming with splendor, 
Each branch appeared dipped in pure gold, 

And the hillocks, alike, with the valleys, 
Were garbed as in silvery mold. 

Not e'en the great arch-way of heaven, 

Rainbow'd with its myriad hues, 
Seemed half so sublime as our sun-set 

With its gold, crimson, garnet, and blues. 

'Twas by far a sight more resplendent 
Than gold-art that painter e'er seen, 

For a'rear the great banks of white cloudlets 
Sank, godlike, the sun, as in dream. 

Methought, as I saw it far falling, 

All brilliant and golden to eye, 
Thou art heaven's bright harbinger calling ! 

To, light greater, that never shall die. 

Roll on! Thou bright orb of the heavens ! 

Speed round! with thy coursers of light, 
Till, that sun, ever rising, ne'er setting, 

Shall in- welcome millennial light. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



197 



Conscience will surely speak 
Though tongues were out of use 





A good conscience is to the soul 

WHAT HEALTH IS TO THE BODY. 




"It is astonishing how soon the whole 

i conscience begins to unravel if a single * 

H stitch drops; one single sin indulged in, S 

$ makes a hole you could put your head m 



1 THROUGH. 

1 



Charles Burton. 




198 STRAY THOUGHTS. 



A GOOD CONSCIENCE. 

Conscience is a great moral factor universal as 
the race. It is the religious principle, native to the 
make-up of man. Cowardice may ask concerning 
an act, is it safe; expediency, is it politic; and 
pride ask, is it popular ; but a good conscience, never 
parleys, or banters as to the safety, the expediency, 
or the popularity of an act. Only one question 
does it ever ask, namely, Is it right ? Every life 
which is directed by a good conscience, has but one 
single motive, in every deed performed, and that 
motive is, the rightness of the deed to be performed, 
and the rightness of the spirit in which it is per- 
formed. 

Upon conscience there is turned the full light of 
revelation, and that light is never dim, but, flashes 
with a brilliancy, sufficient to reveal to every honest 
observer, the real condition of his own spiritual life. 
Here, is the divine record, in unmistakable terms,, 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 199 

defining an ignorant conscience; a defiled con- 
science ; a seared conscience ; and a good conscience, 
and, these all will be called and quickened at the 
final Judgment to show the work of the law writ- 
ten in the hearts of their possessors, accusing, or 
else excusing, in that day, when God shall judge 
the secrets of men. O ! Conscience ! How loud ! 
how clear it speaks ! Even as the alarm connected 
with door and window, signals any evil attempt to 
assail or enter, so, Conscience, the echo of God in the 
human soul, forever stands on guard, and, with its 
native instincts enlightened by divine truth, watches 
sleeplessly, over every thought and purpose of the 
life. It is the divine, electric-like thrill which 
flashes the alarm, when thought or purpose forbid- 
den or wicked seeks to enter the soul, yea, more ; it 
is as the voice of God, speaking with the distinct- 
ness and authority of audible speech. Conscience, 
is the soul's guarding sword-flame, which trembles ; 
wavers ; and flashes ; to protect its purity, and, he 
who does not act in the right, and, for the truth, 
must be often wounded ; pierced ; cut ; and burned. 



200 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

Conscience, is the appointed vice-gerent of heaven, 
in inflicting punishment if its commands be not 
obeyed, or, its warnings be not regarded. It pro- 
nounces, and forever reiterates a sentence upon our 
own conduct. Its penalty is remorse and regret 
and that penalty will be demanded in full, if its 
promptings be not heeded. 

As a part of God's moral government, it is an 
admirable device, urging man to the performance of 
duty, and in case of disobedience, making the mind, 
in some degree and, for some length of time, its own 
executioner. 

All past historic records, religious and secular, 
affirm that conscience is a moral susceptibility in 
man, and, may under the direction of intelligence 
and will be made better or worse. It may be 
obeyed and strengthened in truth until it reaches 
the most tender and sensitive condition on all moral 
questions, or, it may be neglected and trampled upon, 
till, like the consciences of the abandoned sinners 
mentioned in the Pauline letter, it is "seared as 
with a hot iron," an extremely sad condition leading 



STKAY THOUGHTS. 201 

to the loss of moral feeling, to which they gradually 
descend by a continued committal of wrong. O ! 
that from your lips, dear reader, may often rise the 
prayer of a saint in the early church : 

O ! that my tender soul might fly 

The first abhorred approach of *ll 
Quick as the apple of an eye 

The slightest touch of sin to feel. 

The pangs inflicted by a guilty conscience will 
follow the offender into the most secluded retreat ; 
over-take him in his most rapid flight ; find him out 
in northern-snows and southern-sands of the equa- 
tor; go into the most splendid palaces and there 
seek out its victim where he thinks he is safe from 
all the vengeance which man can inflict. Yea ; pur- 
sue him even into the dark valley of the shadow of 
death having arrested him as a fugitive in distant 
worlds. 

David, cried out in anguish of spirit " My sin is 
ever before me." Like a shadow, a spectre, a Phan- 
tom, it followed wherever he went. At mid-day, 
he saw it by the light of meridian sun, and, at mid- 



202 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

night, he heard its silent tread. His waking hours 
and dreams, alike, were troubled with an aroused 
and injured conscience, and so continued, till, he 
repentingly prayed " Have mercy, upon me, O, God ! 
have mercy upon me ; Hide thy face from my sin, 
and, blot out all mine iniquity." 

What shall be said of him whose aroused con- 
science ever gnaws, yet he will not repent? There 
is naught left but torture and agony of mind ! Such 
an one often pales and sickens and wastes away! 
Perchance, his reason reels, his brain looses its force, 
and raving, they chain him to a rock, with a pallet 
of straw upon which to lie, and, alone they leave him 
till he shall breathe out his existence, an unrepent- 
ant, and, unforgiven sinner. 

Priest ; prophet ; or preacher ; may not always be 
made aware of sin in the individual beside him, but, 
the sinner himself is always cognizant of its pres- 
ence, for, there is in him, a Nathan-Conscience, which 
speaks in tones that must be heard, saying " Thou 
art the man." 

True, all persons are not troubled, alike, with 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 203 

conscience, in this particular way, but, for them it 
would be far better if they were, for, if conscience 
does not check them, sooner or later Justice will, and 
when Justice, without mercy, shall have been aroused, 
Conscience-calls will be in vain ! Justice, with grasp 
infinite, will uplift, and over-hurl them, from the 
battlements of time, into the shoreless sea, of a 
remorseful eternity ! 

Yes I of all such, it is written " his eyes shall see 
his destruction, and, he shall drink of the wrath of 
the Almighty." O ! the terrors of that fear which 
is based upon the consciousness of guilt ! No one 
can describe it ! None wish to reflect upon it ! Cain r 
had carved upon his brow, the sin-brand of heaven's 
wrathstroke, and, this he carried until death, but, the 
sin-committer of this advanced spiritual age, bears 
in his mind forever, the wrongs of former years. 
Conscience can not be bribed ! Conscience will not 
be quiet ! The individual sin in its separateness may 
be forgotten, but an outlined remembrance of all, is 
ever there, and, at the first and faintest call of an 
awakened, or, reminded conscience, they come troop- 



204 STEAT THOUGHTS. 

ing up in all their deformity. Yes ! for thoughts of 
by-gone years are lulled in the countless chambers 
of the brain. Awake but one and lo ! What 
myriads rise ! Our thoughts are locked by many a 
a hidden chain. Each stamps its image as the other 
flies ! Jesus, who fully understood the force of con- 
science, said, to the Pharisees, when they bade him 
decide the punishment of a frail, and, foolish woman, 
Tou know that, for such a sin, the law requires 
death by stoning, then ask me not to decide, but, 
rather, " let him that is without sin, cast the first 
stone." That was enough! Inspiration declares 
that " they which heard it being convicted by their 
own consciences went out one by one beginning at 
the eldest even unto the last." 

Conscience, in an instant revivified and reout- 
lined the faults and follies of their own lives and 
under its lashings they fled from the Silent Savior 
as though every finger-touch of the stooping ground- 
writer was calling up a stroke of deserved wrath 
from the rod of an angry but righteous Judge. No 
words of Christ, but, their own conscience told them, 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 205- 

they, also, were criminated and, under the fear of a 
falling wrath-stroke, they silently slipped away into 
secrecy ! 

The widow of Zerephath, weeps at the death-bed 
of her son ! weeps much for his death, weeps more 
for her sins, for, in this her hour of adversity, the 
loud calls of conscience had alarmed her by suddenly 
calling up the errors of the past, and, amid a flood 
of tears she cries out to Elijah the Prophet of God 
" Art thou come unto me to call my sin to remem- 
brance ? " Conscience, in alarming colors, repictured 
her former career, and, this, added to the adversity 
of the hour, filled her with almost unbearable grief ! 

The sleeping lion, caged in the royal gardens of 
the east, never rose at the lash of its master's whip, 
quicker, or, more fierce, than conscience rises in the 
time of a sinful man's distress. 

These are the hours, in which, that sin, becomes 
gall to the palate, which had formerly been rolled 
as a " sweet morsel under the tongue'' for, then, 'tia 
as Goldsmith says, 

Remembrance wakes, with all her busy train, 
Swells at the breast, and turns the past to pain. 



206 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

A self-condemning conscience is, not merely, a 
dagger with which the soul is pierced, but, a dagger 
deep-dipped in poison, and, the poison mixed with 
our own hands ! Under the stroke of self-condem- 
nation, which is the reproof of conscience, the soul, 
worries, withers, and, wastes away. 

The Pauline affirmation is that all persons are 
responsible beings, those who have the written law 
and are enlightened in it and those who have not 
the written law, for in each there is a spirit- written 
law sustained by a conscience which in right and 
truth, bids; in wrong and error; forbids! 

The Apostolic-chief terms it " a law written in 
their hearts, their conscience, also, bearing witness 
to it." Thus, is the rule of right and wrong, so 
plainly marked, that, there is no question concerning 
our life-duty. Conscience ; and, not the conscience 
of the individual only, but, the conscience of the 
whole human race, speaks so plainly, that, there is 
no room for any deliberation. The world of man- 
kind is chain-bound by this conscience law written 
by the spirit of God in the fleshy tablets of the 



STRAY THOUGHTS 207 

heart. To the wrong-spirited, conscience ever wears 
a frown, but, to the innocent and honest, it wreathes 
itself in sweetest smiles and becomes a genial com- 
panion and playmate of the soul. Oh ! the delights 
of a soul, thus, calmed continually, by a good con- 
science! Like the helpless infant resting on its 
mother's arms in perfect trust and quiet, so, rests 
that soul on the arm of God, even though, at times, 
that arm seems wreathed with lightning. 

To an innocent conscience, there are no terrors ! 
To such, even the lightnings are divested of every- 
thing which can harm, and instead of flooding the 
heart with anxiety, and unrest, they shine and charm 
like flower-beauties, and, play like sum-beams round 
the soul. 

How shall we obtain, or rather, retain such a con 
science ? Let inspired men, answer ! " There is no 
condemnation to those who walk not after the flesh 
but after the spirit." And where there is no condem- 
nation the soul may expand itself as confidently 
and lovingly to God's presence and favor, as bud- 
ding flowers unfold to the sun ! yes ; to have a 



208 STKAY THOUGHTS. 

conscience which neither condemns nor accuses ia 
our relation to life's affairs is to have a life full of joy, 
deep ; godlike ; and permanent ! Experience affirms 
what holy- writ declares. "If our hearts condemn 
us not, then, have we confidence toward God," and, 
" Happy is he that condemn eth not himself, in that 
thing which he alloweth." Obedience to a spiritually 
enlightened conscience, has lifted weak men up to 
the highest possible heights of moral grandeur, and 
efficiency, but, disobedience, to the same strong pleas 
have hurled strong men from the most exalted 
eminences of moral beauty, down, to the coldest, and 
most hopeless, valley-depths of degradation, to which 
a man can ever come. O ! convert, seek ever, seek 
always, and in all circumstances, to retain a good con- 
science, such as shall be void of offense toward God 
and man, then, will your life be full of satisfactory 

joys! 

One of these days the sun will rise, 

But will not rise for thee, 
For one of these days, all wrapped 

In silent rest, thou'lt be 
Approaching swift or slow, 

None know; Yet each one feels, 
Some day, it will be so. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 209 

So, do thou strive, through every day, 

To do the best you can, 
And let approving conscience be 

Thy whole and highest aim, 
. That some kind friend may say, 

When thou'st laid life's burden down, 
" The world is better, that he lived. " 

Ah ! This shall be thy Crown ! 

O ! Yes, Paul ! it is with us, as with thee, our 
" rejoicing is this, the testimony of our conscience^ 
that, in simplicity, and Godly sincerity, we have 
had our conversation in the world." 



210 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



"HOW SOFT THE MUSIC OF THOSE VILLAGE 
BELLS, FALLING AT INTERVALS UPON" THE EAR, 
IN" CADENCE SWEET." 

Cowper. 



"Hear the loud alarum bells — 

Brazen bells ! 
What a tale of terror, now, their turbu- 
lency tells ! 
In the startled ear of night 
How they scream out their affright ! 
Too MUCH HORRIFIED to speak, 
They can only shriek, shriek, 
Out of tune." Edgar A. Poe. 





FIRST METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, VALPARAISO, IND. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 211 



THE VILLAGE CHURCH BELL. 

The world is wide and life is long. 

Ah! Much of their good have I seen; 
And here and there is a sight or song 

That will ever in memory keep green. 

But in all my wanderings round the sphere, 

On sea or in mountain dell, 
No music so sweet hath thrilled mine ear 

As the chimes of our village church bell. 

Its call rings out o'er all the place, 

To its 'semblies night and day; 
Bidding all repair to a throne of grace, 

There to think, and sing, and pray. 

Now; alas! deep sorrow, from its molten tongue, 
Comes mantling with grief each soul, 

As it tells, ' ' there hath died some precious one," 
In slow-measured, deep-muffled toll. 

But it merrily chimes to the youthful mind, 
As it rings out those gladdest hours! 

When heart-and-heart love's pledge doth bind 
'Midst the altar-twined marriage flowers. 

Hark! Hark! its alarm! A fire somewhere! 

Alas! Now, its clang sharp and wild! 
And the villagers rush as helpers there, 

To save cottage or home and child. 



212 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

Thus a friend, indeed! for full many a year, 
Our sweet -sounding village church bell 

Hath instilled souls with joy or aroused them to fear r 
As its peace-notes or fire-warns fell. 

O! How years have sped by, ne'er to return, 

Leaving many bright stories to tell; 
But the sweetest of thoughts stored in memory's urn, 

Are recalled by the echoing village church bell. 

A harp with a thousand strings may be sweet, 
Its strains make the heart heave and swell; 

But to reach my soul there is naught so fleet, 
As the chimes of our village church bell. 

Then Ring out! Village bell; Ring on, evermore! 

May thy echoing tones never cease ! 
Till thy wavelet-like pearls strike the upper shore, 

Ushering in the millennial peace. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 



213 




214 STRAY THOUGHTS. 



ROCKS ! ! ROCKS ! ! ROCKS ! RAPIDS * 
SANDBARS ! SHALLOWS ! 

These, one or all, will be found somewhere in the 
long channel of every human life. Against them, if 
thy soul's craft plunge, or into them if it sails, it will, 
perhaps, be broken, shattered, or disabled, forever! 
These spiritual obstructions, are more dreadful in 
their ravages, more terrific in their ruin, than any of 
earth's streams, channels, rivers, or oceans, ever saw* 

Steer clear of the rocks I To do this successfully, 
you must have a steady hand; a clear head; an 
honest heart ! and an unfaltering confidence in the 
God of battles and of storms ! Rocks are all about 
you, and, before you. If they are not there by natural 
causes, then, they are placed there, by wicked, and, 
designing hands, whose possessors, would cruelly, 
yet, gladly, laugh at your downfall, and stumbling, 
and consequent wreck, and, their brows would grow 
black with frowns should they discover some heaven- 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 215 

dispatched angel, commissioned, and sent forth, to 
raise you up again. 

There is but one way to avoid the rocks, and that 
is to seek guidance from above, and, when "the still 
small voice " you hear, immediately follow where it 
leads. There are no rocks on the high seas of holi- 
ness and heart purity, but once away from this 
narrow ; deep ; and straight channel ; we jeopardize 
the soul's-craft. 

The slightest deflection to right or left throws 
you into danger's track. Outside the channel of 
God's own marking, danger-rocks are numerous as 
the night-gems above. Sometimes, in threatening 
attitude, they rise like sea-gods above the surface of 
the waves; sometimes, like unseen and silent sen- 
tinels they are hidden away beneath the surface and 
give no sign of their presence till you dash against 
them and they call a halt. 

Once outside the Bible-taught channel of right- 
eousness,, rocks ; sand-bars ; shallows ; and, rapids ; 
danger-places to the soul, will be seen in great pro- 
fusion. O ! how many there are between here and 



216 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

heaven ! Look, now, at three of the most familiar, 
best known because against them more than others, 
souls have dashed and been crippled or destroyed 
forever. The first we may call the Drift-Rock ! for, 
against this, careless, drifting, souls are most often 
dashed and dazed. It was towards this rock that 
Peter was moving when " he followed the Lord afar 
off." 

As this was the first great mistake of Peter's life, 
so, it is the prime error of many a modern Christian 
life. Widening the distance, by our thoughtlessness, 
between us and the master ! Following afar off, and 
thus, giving opportunity by your carelessness for a 
chasm to form, which if allowed to widen, you may, 
at last, find unbridgable, and thus, resolve itself into 
a great gulf, which none can cross, and, which no 
viaduct can ever span. 

Neglect of our prayer-hours; irregularity at 
divine-worship; carelessness in our bible-studies; 
indifference as to the influence of common conver- 
sation ! all these are forces which steadily ; surely ; 
if not rapidly ; drive souls toward the drift-rock ! 



STEAY THOUGHTS. 217 

Look ! at the second rock which for memory's 
sake and future reference, we may call, Associate- 
Rock I 

O ! the almost unlimited power of associations ! 
Few men rise clear above their associates ! In some 
degree, all are impressed and influenced by their sur- 
roundings. All nature teaches the careful, observant 
student, that every object in its vast realm is the 
result of its surrounding, and, that all the life there 
seen, is derived from its associations. A tree; a 
plant ; a flower ; when seen in their beauty and com- 
pleteness, are but the concentrated results of many 
small forces about them. 

From all these earth, air, moisture, sun, and 
myriad other minute forces, they derive their char- 
acter and existence ; in short, they are what their 
associates make them. The little rill streams plough 
up and plough out the heart of the mountain, and 
leave as a result of their running the deep, abysmal, 
canons and gorges of the west ! A single rain-drop 
may bless, and a single lightning-stroke blast, the 
fairest tree that ever bloomed on earth ! The flower- 



218 STEAY THOUGHTS. 

ing vine of the latticed porch-way may be trimmed 
and trained by one little hand, or torn and destroyed 
by another. 

Little influences ! you say ! yes, indeed they are I 
and if these smaller forces in nature's realm affect so 
seriously these greater objects, who shall say but 
that the ten thousand little influences of your asso- 
ciations will not make or mar your future character. 
The man Solomon, to whom God gave more riches 
and honor and wisdom than to any other in the 
world, declared " A continual dropping weareth the 
stone," and if the great flinty rock is hollowed out 
by the dripping rain-fall from the house-eaves, who 
shall deny that impressions are left upon us by those 
who surround us and with whom we daily associate. 
Look well! to the company you keep! As the 
worldly maxim is " We become like those with whom 
we associate ! " and, as the divine record declares 
"evil communications corrupt good manners" so, all 
history proves that individuals, as a rule, partake of 
the spirit and character of their surroundings, and, 
yet in the face of this threefold warning from the 



STKAY THOUGHTS. 219 

world, history, and the record-divine. Christians 
sometimes carelessly associate with those from whom 
they can gather naught but evil, or, at best more 
evil than good. Beware! young convert of this 
dangerous Associate-Rock ! Hold the helm-chain of 
your soul-craft in your own hands and guide thyself 
carefully, and thus you may avoid the scars and 
stains which mark always and forever the lives of 
careless, drifting, souls ! 

Look ! finally, at the third rock or, as we may 
term it, the Rock of Denial ! This is the rock 
reached before the final soul wreck ! It is the one 
against which Simon Peter dashed, when, in the 
open court, the Jewish damsel jeeringly said, " Thou 
art one of his disciples." Eecoiling from the open- 
courted fire-place, and wilting under the charge that 
fell from the lips of scornful beauty, he uplifted his 
hand to heaven and swore as if on trial, u I know not 
Jesus!" Then, but not till then did he realize 
whither he had been drifting ; of the power of his 
associations ; and much less did he realize his near- 
ness to the danger-rock-denial, but the crash and jar 



220 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

of his swift plunge against it, aroused him, and the 
crowing of the morning watch aroused his drifting ; 
ill-associating ; denying soul ; and looking at his real 
condition, he went out, and wept tears of repentant 
sorrow. 

Have you, unwittingly or through carelessness 
dashed against some one of these rocks, and, are you 
now suffering the effects of the shock ! O ! Weep, 
but weep not forever over this thy wrong, rather 
rise, and, as much as is within thy power, repair the 
breach! Mark the rock and move on thereafter, 
guiding thyself carefully, and thus avoid repeating 
the wrong, for, to repeat the wrong is but to double 
thy crime. 

Bovee, most beautifully and encouragingly says, 
"A sound discretion, is not so much indicated by 
never making a mistake, as by never repeating it," 
and, from the lips of Jesus fell the same idea, at 
least in inference, when he said to the temple-loving 
convert, whose health had so lately been restored 
near the Bethesda-porches: " Behold, thou art made 
whole, go thy way and sin no more lest a worse 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 221 

thing come upon thee." The past is forever past> 
and by you, of it, there can be no alteration ! Though 
all the yellow-gold of earth's mines were yours you 
could not bribe the recording-angel, nor, erase from 
the records a single one of all the indelible pen-lines 
already written there. Leave then the past with 
God and look well to the future ! A radiant future 
is before you if you are willing to apply the lessons 
learned from a study of previous errors. 

Such a study can not be fruitless if from it you 
gather the material for future victory and thus by 
Christ-like movements hereafter, conquer the " prince 
of the power of the air," and quickly turn the dark- 
ness of the past into light for the future. Droop 
not ! Be not discouraged ! Lift up your head and 
look into the eyes of your living ; loving ; forgiving 
Saviour ! who was tempted in all points as you are 
and while he was " without sin " yet is he touched 
with all the feeling of your infirmity, and, ready, 
yea, deeply anxious to succor those in need. Look ! 
then into the eyes of Christ, and, if you have erred 



222 STRAY THOUGHTS. 

and are now repentant, read at once as did denying 
Peter the double message of rebuke and pardon. 

O ! With what tender terms is every new-created 
soul addressed ! The epistles breathe the spirit of 
Christ ! As applied to young converts, they are full 
of the most endearing names ! Listen to John, the 
beloved, as he says : " I write unto you, little chil- 
dren, because ye have known the Father,' because, 
"your sins are forgiven you for his name's sake," and 
now little children, abide in him that when he shall 
appear ye may have confidence and not be ashamed 
at his coming " and, again, u Now are we the sons of 
God and it doth not yet appear what we shall be, 
but we know that when he shall appear we shall be 
like him." 

Children of God ! Take counsel from the inspired 
Paul and if you think you now stand, " take heed, 
lest you fall ! " You are as yet, but " babes in Christ " 
and as such keep in mind that a young child does not 
walk, but is carried ; does not know, but is taught ; 
does not think, but is thought for ; does not keep, 
but is kept ; does not save, but is saved ; does not 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 223 

tand, but is holden up ; therefore, go through life, 
leaningly, lovingly, trustingly, and if you will be 
very child-like to God, He will be very God-like to 
you ; and the less you are to yourself the more will 
Christ always be to you. 



224 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 




"Time shall be no longer." 



Bible. 



STRAY THOUGHTS. 225 



OLD YEAR AND NEW. 

The old year *s gone ! Naught can recall ! 

Its moments, months ! Or hours past I 
Its record helps us ! Rise or fall! 

'Tis sure to meet us ! First or last ! 

The old year's gone, swift rolling by 
Its clouds and brightness, each 

An arch-way forming to the sky, 
And richest lessons teach. 

As rain-bow spans the eastern hills 
When floods have passed away; 

So with the old year's joys and ills, 
They came, but did not stay. 

The old year's gone! the new year's come! 

What thoughts our hearts now thrill; 
Some vows are paid ; and unpaid, some, — 

Their memories haunt us still . 

Come, Spirit! Come! Thou angel white! 

And carve our names anew! 
From this, the last-born new year's night! 

Henceforth may all be true! 

True, to the cause we love so well; 

True, in thy eyes, O God! 
Spent and spending thy truth to tell, 

Ere we sleep in the cold earth-sod. 



p f 



